J 




Glass T^g"^ ?^ 
Book ,F^H(^ ^ 



IggO 




MAY RILEY SMI III 



WAIFS, 






AND THEIR AUTHORS, 



A. Ai^' HOPKINS. 



ILLUSTRATED. 



?.^^:*^^ 



BOSTON: 

D. LOTHROP AND COMPANY, 

32 Feankijn Steeet. 



COPYRIGHT BY 

A. A. HOPKINS. 

1879. 



f> 




Irh Dedication. 



HERE are sweet-singing birds of song \ 

That sing in easy range of ally j, 

And thro' the tumult of the throngs 1 

Their tender grace of tone let fall \ 

Their notes are set in finest tune *; 

With hope and sorrow ^ faith and care j \ 

They breathe a breath of balmy June ) 

On bleak December's chilly air. ^ 

Beside the weary way they sing * 

Till longing souls their pain forget^ \ 

And dream of rest where blossoms springs \ 

Beyond the deserts of regret. \ 

Perchance when silence steals along ^ \ 

The singerSy lisfning^ wait to hear - 1 

Some echo of their own sweet song \ 

Float upward to them sweet and clear, \ 

And so from silence tuneful grown^ \ 

The while they silent^ lisfning waii^ I 

To these I echo back their own^ ^ \ 

To these their own I dedicate. \ 




PREFACE. 

OT all the singers sit on library shelves, in dainty cos- 
tume of blue and gold, and sing to select audiences. 
Some, who sing most sweetly, occupy the " Poet's Cor- 
ner" of the newspaper, and find listeners in homes where stately 
singers seldom come. They have their mission. They sing of 
faith and hope and love, so simply, so tenderly, so sympathetic- 
ally, that the heart of the people is touched. They strengthen the 
popular faith ; they give new hope to the desponding ; they move 
us all to broader good-will and a nobler charity. Known or un- 
known, they make friends. 

It is these whom I denominate Newspaper Poets. When 
I began writing of them, I i-ealized, so numerous is the class, that 
there must be certain limitations ; hence I determined to treat 
only .of such as had produced one poem, at least,- which had been 
extensively copied by the press. Then I decided to include none 
but living writers ; and my next determination was to include no 
Waif whose author had gathered his or her poems in a volume. 
These limitations appeared desirable, even necessary — I have held 
rigidly by them. "Kate Cameron" has passed away, since I first 
WTOte of her ; and Benj. F, Taylor has lately put forth a collec- 



iv PREFACE. . 

tion of "Old -Time Pictures," in his inimitable verse, to the great 
delight of thousands ; but both came within the bounds I had set, 
when treated of, and I have not chosen t, exclude either now. 

The chapters which follow v/ere originally contributed to The 
American Rural Home. Each has been carefully revised ; two or 
three have been almost entirely re -written ; and much interesting 
matter, biographical and poetical, has been added to them all. 
I have not aimed in any case to be critical, nor have I sought to 
analyze the various authors treated of, My one purpose has been, 
in every instance, to tell a Waif's story — M'hen it had any to tell ; 
to make its authorship definitely known ; to narrate what might 
be of general interest touching its author ; and to show, by other 
selections from his or her pen, what are that author' s tendencies 
cf thought and peculiarities of style. 

The book has cost me not a little of painstaking. I was led 
to attempt it because I happened to know the authorship of a few 
Waifs whose authorship was generally unknown ; because I hap - 
pened also to know the authors, and could speak of them intelli - 
gently ; and because I thought many people would be glad to read 
somewhat concerning them. To trace out the parentage of other 
waifs, in regard to which I had no information whatever, was not 
easy ; and having succeeded in doing this, I have found it very 
difficult to obtain such other facts as I desired. A few of these 
chapters may testify of my patience 

I should have taken pleasure in making this volume far more 
elaborate in print and dress, and would gladly have added a por- 
trait of each author ; but the poems it presents are for the popular 



PREFACE. V 

heart, they deserve popular perusal, they will uplift and make glad 
wherever they go, and they shall not be debarred from going into 
any home, in their present form, because of high price. 

Of course the Waifs are not all here. If this volume shall 
find sufficient encouragement, another and similar one may be 
forthcoming in due time. 

A. A, H. 

The Rural Home Sanctum, 




CONTENTS. 

Poets Page 

May Riley Smith ._--.-_i 
Lewis J. Bates ____-_. jg 

— Benjamin F. Taylor -------35 

Eliza O. Peirson ------- 57 

M. H. Cobb - - . - - - - - 67 

James G. Clark - - - - - - - 79 

Mary F. Tucker -------99 

J. W. Baiker _--_-_- log 

M. A. Kidder ------- 121 

Charles M. Dickinson - - - - - - 129 

Delle W. Norton 141 

Francis M. Finch 157 

Margaret E. Sangster -----« 169 

Simeon Tucker Clark - - 187 

Kate B. W. Barnes -.-.-. 207 

John H. Yates ------- 221 

Ethel Lynn Beers - 239 

Rosa H. Thorpe - - ... - - - 259 

George W. Bungay - 271 

Mary Clemmer -_.-_-- 287 

Harriet Prescott SpofFord ----- 303 

Poems 

If we Knew --------i 

If - - . 5 

Tired Mothers 7 

Waiting -.. ------ 9 

To My Mother 10 



CONTENTS. 



Page 
In Prison _-_.-_ --ii 

Sometimes __.__.» 14 

His Name Shall be in Their Foreheads - - - 16 
Under the Ice _----._ ig 

By-and-By 25 

Right Can Afford to Wait ----- 27 

Son-e Sweet Day - - - - - - -31 

Oui Better Day - 33 

The Long Ago ------- 36 

The Beautiful River ------ 40 

God Bless our Stars Forever ----- 43 

The New Craff- in the Offing - - - . 49 

The Old Fashioned Choir 50 

A Winter Psalm _----_ 52 

The Rose and the Robin - - - - - 55 

Ripe Wheat ■ 58 

Mignonette -------60 

Over the Graves ------ 6j 

A Swedish I^egend - - - - ■63 

Light on the Hills -...-_ 65 

The World Would be the Better for It ^- - - 68 
The Ships that Sail Away ..... 72 

December ----- • - - 73 

A Ship Sailed out to Sea 74 

The Mountain in the West 76 

Art Thou Living Yet ..... -rg 

The Mountains of Life 83 

The Beautiful Hills 84 

Marion Moore - - 85 

Sweet Ruth 87 

Leona ....-----go 

The Dawn of Redemption ----- 93 

The Wood Robin - . - - - - - 96 



CONTENTS. xi 

Cometh a Blessing Down ..... 99 

Going Up and Coming Down . - - _ 100 

Indian Summer __-._-- 102 

A Picture __._-__ 104 

Thou 105 

Invocation __.-__- 106 

I Love Him So -- 108 

Picking Lint _---___ 109 

Ey-and-By - - - - - - •• iii 

Under the Snow -----«- 112 

Darning Stockings - - - - - - - 113 

Morning's Advent --_-_. 116 
Purpose - - - - - - - -118 

The Bright Side - - 121 

Watch Mother - - 123 

Buying Crown Jewels ------ 125 

Who Misses Him .._---- 126 

The Children 129 

Of Bessie .-- 135 

The Drummer Boy ------ 135 

How far from Heaven ------ 136 

Do Not Slam the Gate 141 

The Missing Ship -_-._- 143 

Call me no Longer Thine ----- 145 

At Rest i47 

Gangin Awa --_-__- 150 

To the Robin Redbreast - - -^ - - 152 

My Kingdom ---_-__ 154 

The Blue and the Gray 158 

The Storm King -__-__ 166 

Are the Children at Home - - _ _ _ 169 

A Vesper Song .----__ 174 

The Welcome - - - - - - -176 

Our Own 177 



CONTENTS. 

The Heaven Side - - 178 

Before the Leaves Fall - - .. - - 179 

The Building of the Nest . . - - . 180 

/Wayfarers - - - -.- - - 181 

Sufiicient Unto the Dpy - - - - - - 183 

Alice Gary - - - - - - - 184 

Coming and Going - - - - - - - 188 

Geraldine - - - - - - 190 

Perdita __.____- 1^2 

To the Venus of Milo ------ 193 

Three Sonnets, but no Song - - - - - -194 

Love is Sweeter than Rest . _ _ _ ig6 

Sympathy - - - -- - - - 197 

G61den-Rod 19S 

The Thorn and Gross __--_- 201 

Toward Emmaus _._•-_- 203 

Why the Sea Gomplains - - - - - . - 204 

Sn"^ileWhen e'er You Gan - - - - - 211 

Patient Waiting - - - - - - - 212 

The Unprofitable Servant - - •• - - 213 

The Departed - . - , _ - _ 215 
Old-Fashioned Songs - - • • - -217 

The Time to Gome - - - - - - - 218 

In Time of Trial -_---.- 219 

The Old Man in the New Church . - - - 221 

John 's Gone off To-Day - - - - - 232 

In the old Forsaken School House - - • - 235 

A Song of Home 237 

The Picket Guard 239 

On the Shores of Tennessee ... - 243 

The Tallest Soldier of them All - - - 246 

Weighing the Baby . - . . ^^ . 247 

Grannie's Test .-.._. 249 

Which Shall it Be -251 



CONTENTS. 

xiii 

The Gold Nugget , 253 

The Evergreen's Moan , _ - _ . 256 

Curfew must not Ring To-Night - _ „ 25q 

Down the Track ---__. 263 

The Luck of Muncaster - - - . . 265 

Waiting 268 

Bless God for Rain --.-__ 271 

The Locomotive ----._ 273 

The Creeds of the Bells ----.. 276 

The Night Wind ...... 280 

The English Sparrow - - - - - - 281 

The Artists of the Air - - - . _ 283 

The Captain's Sweetheart = - - . - 285 

The Childless Mother - - - - . 287 

Words for Parting - - - _ - . „ 200 

Arbutus ---__.__ 2Q2 

Fall In 296 

Good-by, Sweetheart 208 

Something Beyond - oqo 

The Christ oqi- 

A Four-0-Clock ______ ^03 

The Rose --_..._ ^q^ 

Daybreak --______ ^07 

Song _ . _ 3J.Q 

April - - 310 

O, Soft Spring Airs -----> 311 
Under the Snowdrift - - . - . -312 

Afternoon ---.-._ 313 

S(5rrow ------.. 314 



MAY RILEY SMITH. 




EW v/aifs have found more frequent editorial 
adoption and house-room than one generally 
bearing the title '^If We Knew." Every news- 
paper in the land, almost, has given it. a place from year to 
year, since it strayed from home. Careless scissors early 
clipped away all hint of authorship, and careless compos- 
itors have so marred the waif itself that often it seems in 
disguise. On one occasion, indeed, it has been awkward- 
ly transformed, and, with a new name attached, has gone 
abroad with a new claimant for its parentage. Perhaps it 
is going so, still. It originally appeared in the Rochester 
Union (5f^d/z^^r/zj^r of February 23, 1867, with its author's 
identity thinly veiled under the initials *'M. L. R.," and 
the date of ' ' Brighton. " We give it as then put forth : 

IF WE KNEW. 

If we knew the woe and heart-aclie 

Waiting for us down the road, 
If our lips could taste the wormwood, 

If our backs could feel the load ; 
Would we waste to-day in wishing 

For a time that ne'er can be ? 
Would we wait in such impatience 

For our ships to come from sea .? 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

If we knew the baby fingers 

Pressed against the window-pane, 
Would be cold and stiff to-morrow — 

Never trouble us again ; 
Would the bright eyes of our darling 

Catch the frown upon our brow? 
Would the prints of rosy fingers 

Vex us then as they do now ? 

Ah, those little ice-cold fingers, 

How they point our memories back 
To the hasty words and actions 

Strewn along our backward track ! 
How those little hands remind us, 

As in snowy grace they lie, 
Not to scatter thorns, but roses. 

For our reaping by-and-by ! 

Strange we never prize the music 

Till the sweet-voiced bird has flown : 
Strange that we should slight the violets 

Till the lovely flowers are gone ; 
Strange that summer skies and sunshine 

Never seem one-half so fair 
As when Winter's snowy pinions 

Shake their white down in the air ! 

Lips from which the seal of silence 

None but God can roll away, 
Never blossomed in such beauty 

As adorns the mouth to-day ; 
And sweet words that freight our memory 

With their beautiful periume, 
Come to us in sweeter accents 

Through the portals of the tomb. 



MA Y RILE V SMITH. 3 

Let us gather up the sunbeams 

Lying all along our path ; 
Let us keep the wheat and roses, 

Casting out the thorns and chaff ; 
Let us find our sweetest comfort 

In the blessings of to-day ; 
"With a patient hand removing 

All the briars from our way. 

Before Mrs. Albert Smith, now of Chicago, Illinois, 
was married to the m.an of her choice in the Brick 
Church of Rochester, N. Y. — which was about seven years 
ago — she lived in Brighton, a suburb of that city, and 
V/rote herself May Louise Riley. She was born on the 
29th of May, 1842, in that same Brighton, in a pretty 
white cottage surrounded by trees, and shrubs, and flow- 
ers, its very atmosphere suggestive of things poetical. 
"Wasn't it long," she wrote once to a friend, "to live 
in the old house twenty-seven years .? to call it home all 
that time .f* " Of course she was away somewhat — at 
Brockport Collegiate Institute two years ; another year 
she devoted herself to painting ; another year she spent 
at the West. ' ' But all that time, " she wrote, * ' I came 
and went from the old home. Saw father die there, and 
a sister, and seven years ago brother Charlie followed 
them, and came no more back forever." 

Of a warm, impulsive nature, her love for her birth- 
place, and for the old associations clinging about it, glows 
in the very tone of her words. It is an element akin to 
this which makes her poems so popular — their homelinQS?,, 



4 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

we might almost say. They are never cold, icy bits of 
intellectuality, which you can admire but do not feel ; 
they come welling up warmly from her heart, and sink 
tremulously into yours. The chords she strikes are re- 
sponsive chords. She touches the key-note of all that is 
best in human nature — sympathy — and it vibrates every- 
where. To those who know ]\Irs. Smith, it is no wonder 
that she writes as she does. There is nothing somber in 
her blue eyes, nor in her light-brown hair or sunshiny 
face. She believes in the bright side ; she sings as she- 
believes. In conversation and in correspondence her 
nature is manifest, and she wins friends wherever she goes. 

''If We Knew" was one of Mrs. Smith's earliest 
poems. It has not quite the finish of some later efforts, 
but has in a large degree her individuality. It is one of 
those simple, unpretending things, far easier in the seem- 
ing than in the doing, unless one be born thereto, which 
will continue to live. Having been set to music, under 
title of "Scatter seeds of kindness," the last three stanzas 
appear often in school song-books, and are often sung. 
Gerrit Smith had an especial liking for them, and at his 
burial they were sung by a choir of children from the or- 
phan asylum he endowed and maintained. 

Mrs. Smith has fine literary taste, and writes grace- 
fully and excellently in prose. She has contributed 
sketches, as well as poems, to various newspapers and 
other periodicals, and some of them have been widely 
copied. The Troy Whig, The Union and Advertiser 2C[idi 



MA Y RILE V SMITH. 5 

The Rural Home, of Rochester, and one or two of the 
New York story papers, have pubHshed many contribu- 
tions from her pen. She writes easily and rapidly, with 
a felicitous choice of words ; and in general her versifica- 
tion is very melodious, very perfect. 

We have alluded to her sympathy. One can hardly 
find real poetic sentiment allied to more tender sympathy 
than is contained in this poem : 

'IF." 

If, sitting with this little worn-out shoe 
And scarlet stocking lying on my knee, 

I knew the little feet had pattered through 

The pearl-set gates that lie 'twixt heaven and me, 

I could be reconciled and happy too, 
And look with glad eyes toward the Jasper Sea 

If, in the morning, when the song of birds 
Reminds me of a music far more sweet, 

I listen for his pretty broken words 
And for the music of his dimpled feet, 

I could be almost happy, though I heard 
No answer, and but saw his vacant seat. 

I could be glad, if, when the day is done, 
And all its cares and heart-aches laid away, 

I could look westward to the hidden sun. 

And, with a heart full of sweet yearnings, say — 
" To-night I 'm nearer to my little one 
By just the travel of a single day." 

If I could know those little feet were shod 
In sandals, wrought of light in better lands. 



d WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

And that the foot-prints of a tender God 
Ran side by side with his, in jjolden sands, 

I could bow cheerfully and Kiss the rod, 
Since Benny was in wiser, safer hands. 

If he were dead, I would not sit to-day 

And stain with tears the wee sock on my knee ; 
I would not kiss the tiny shoe, and say, 
" Bring back again my little boy to me ' " 
I would be patient, knowing 't was God's way. 
And wait to meet him o'er death's silent sea. 

But O ! to know the feet, once pure and white, 
The haunts of vice have boldly ventured in ! 

The hands that should have battled for the right 
Have been wrung crimson in the clasp of sin ! 

And should he knock at heaven's gate, to-night, 
I fear my boy could hardly enter in. 

^ome mother has wept over it, we are certain — some 
one whose motherhood brings her more of sorrowing 
than of joy. Mayhap, too, some wa}^vard Benny, feeling 
his mother's heart throb in every line, has come back to 
purer paths for her sake. Who knows ? This poem has 
also strayed widely as a waif. There are few more real- 
istic bits of verse, and it stands in pathetic witness against 
a theory held by many good people, that genuine pathos 
can come only from actual experience — that poets must 
''learn in sorrow what they teach in song." When Mrs. 
Smith wrote ''If," she knew not the joys of motherhood, 
in her own person, and some will ask, "How, then, could 
she be so touched by its possible pain .? Is poetic senti- 




■A little elbow leans upon your knee, 
Your tired knee that has so much to bear ; 
A child's dear eyes are looking lovingly 
From underneath a thatch ot tangled hair." Page 7. 



MA V RILE V SMITH. 7 

ment all a fiction ? " No, the sentiment is real always, 
when it is true, and it makes impress only in proportion 
to its truth ; but the reality may be of fancy alone, or, if 
you please, of sympathetic imagination. That which you 
read with a heart-throb, was written with a heart-throb. 
There is a fiction of sentiment so real, momentarily, to 
the poet, that others may be excused for believing it real 
always. In further evidence of this, we have the follow- 
ing, written for T/ie AM'ne, and thence widely re-printed : 

TIRED MOTHERS. ■ ■ 

A. litde elbow leans upon your knee, 

Your tired knee that has so much to bear ; 
A child's dear eyes are looking lovingly 

From underneath a thatch of tangled hair. 
Perhaps you do not heed the velvet touch 

Of warm, moist fingers holding yours so tight ; 
You do not prize this blessing overmuch ; 

You almost are too tired to pray, to-night. 

But it is blessedness ! A year ago 

I did not see it as I do to-day — 
We are so dull and thankless, and so slow 

To catch the sunshine till it slips away. 
And now it seems surpassing strange to me 

That, while I wore the badge of motherhood, 
I did not kiss more oft and tenderly 

The little child that brought me only good. 

And if, some night, when you sit down to rest, 
You miss this elbow from your tired knee — 

This restless, curly head from off your breast, 
This lisping tongue that chatters constantly ; 



8 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

If from your own the dimpled hands had slipped, 
And ne 'er would nestle in your palm again ; 

If the white feet into their grave had tripped, 
I could not blame you for your heart-ache then. 

I wonder so that mothers ever fret 

At little children clinging to their gown ; 
Or that the foot-prints, when the days are wet, 

Are ever black enough to make them frown. 
If I could find a little muddy boot. 

Or cap or jacket, on my chamber floor ; 
If I could kiss a rosy, restless foot. 

And hear it patter in my home once more : 

If I could mend a broken cart to-day, 

To-morrow make a kite to reach the sky — 
There is no woman in God's world could say 

She was more blissfully content than I. 
But, ah ! the dainty pillow next my own 

Is never rumpled by a shining head ; 
My singing birdling from its nest has flown ; 

The little boy I used to kiss is dead ! 

Did we not know how strong the mother instinct is 
in every woman's breast, and did we not realize how 
sympathy can move upon sentiment and bend it at its 
will, there would be no accounting for some of Mrs. 
Smith's poems, written before she came to woman's re- 
gal crown. We have given two of her mother -thoughts 
in rhyme, and for the sake of some who daily feel what 
motherhood's loss can be — who are weary with listening 
for the little feet that nevermore may come, we add this : 



MA Y RILE Y SMITH. 

WAITING. 

When the crickets chirp in the evening, 

And the stars flash out in the sky, 
I sit in my lonely doorway 

And watch the children go by. 
I look at their fresh young faces, 

And hark to each merry word, 
For to me, a child's own language 

Is the sweetest e'er was heard. 

And so I sit in my doorway 

In the hour that I love best, 
And think, as I see them passing. 

My child will come with the rest ; 
Think, when I hear the clicking 

Of the little garden gate, 
My darling's hand is upon it — 

O, why has she come so late ? 

■ But the days have been slowly weaving 

Their warp of toil in my life ; 
The weeks have rolled on me their burden 

Of waiting, and patience, rxnd strife ; 
The flowers that came with the summer 

Have finished their errand so sweet, 
And autumn is dropping her harvest. 

Mellow and ripe, at my feet. 

And yet my little girl comes not, 

And I think she has missed her way, 

And strayed from this cold, dark country 
To one of perpetual day. 

I thiiik that the angels have found her, 
And, loving her better than we. 



lO WAIFS AND THEIR A UIHORS. 

Have begged the Good Father to keep her, 
Right on, through eternity. 

Perhaps. But I long to enfold her, 

To tangle my hand in her hair, 
To feast my starved mouth on her kisses, 

To hear her light foot on the stair. 
I am but a poor, selfish mother. 

And mother -hearts starve though they know 
Their children are drinking the nectar 

From lilies in heaven that blow. 

Some day I am sure I shall find her, 

But the road is so lonesome between, 
My spirit grows sick and impatient 

For a glimpse of the pastures so green ; 
Till then I shall sit in the doorway, 

'In the hour that my heart loves best. 
And think, when the children pass homeward. 

My child will come with the rest. 

The same impulse which prompts Mrs. Smith to pen 
these tender memories of motherhood, breathes out in 
tender, reverential love for the mother whose child she \z. 
On that mother's seventy - third birth - day she penned this 
feeling tribute, which was published in The Rural Home: 

TO MY MOTHER. 
The sweetest face in all the world to me, 

Set in a frame of shining, silver hair ; 
With eyes whose language is fidelity, — 

This is my mother. Is she not most fair ? 

Ten little heads have found their sweetest sleep 
Upon the pillow of her loving breast. 



MA V RILE V SMITH, \ j 

The world is wide : yet nowhere does it keep 
So safe a haven, — so complete a rest. 

Her hands are neither beautiful nor fair, 
. Yet seemed they lovely in her children's eyes, 
We found our daily strength and comfort there, 
And if her hands were rough, — we were not wise 

*T is counted something great to be a queen. 

And bend a kingdom Lo a woman's will ; 
To be a mother such as mine, I ween, 
Is something better and more noble still. 

mother ! in the changeful years now flown, 
Since as a child I leant upon your knee, 

Life has not bi-ought to me, nor fortune shown, 
Such tender love ! such yearning sympathy ! 

Let fortune smile or frown, — whiche'er she will 
It matters not. I scorn her fickle ways ! 

1 never shall be quite bereft, until 

I lose my mother's honest blame and praise ! 

Touchingly sympathetic, though of another ordei 
of sympathy from either poem quoted, is this, entitled 

IN PRISON. 

God pity the wretched prisoners, 

In their lonely cells to-day ! 
Whatever the sins that tripped them, 

God pity them ! still I say. 

Only a strip of sunshine, 

Cleft by rusty bars ; 
Only a patch of azure, 

Only a cluster of stars ; 



t2 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Only a barren future, 

To starve their hope upon ; 
Only stinging memories 

Of a past that's better gone. 
Only scorn from women, 

Only hate from men. 
Only remorse to whisper 

Of a life that might have been. 

Once they were little childi-en, 

And perhaps their unstained feet 
Were led by a gentle mother 

Toward the golden street ; 
Therefore, if in life's forest 

They since have lost their way. 
For the sake of her who loved them, 

God pity them ! still I say. 

O, mothers gone to heaven ! 

With earnest heart 1 ask 
That your eyes may not look earthv/ard 

On the failure of your task ! 
For even in those mansions 

The choking tears would rise, 
Though the fairest hand in heaven 

Would wipe them from your eyes ! 

And you, who judge so harshly. 

Are you sure the stumbling-stone 
That tripped the feet of others 

Might not have bruised your own ? 
Are you sure the sad -faced angel 

Who writes our errors down 
Will ascribe to you more honor 

Than him on whom you frown ? 



AT A Y RILE Y SMITH. 1 3 

Or, if a steadier purpose 

Unto your life is given ; 
A stronger will to conquer, 

A smoother path to heaven ; 
If, when temptations meet you, 

You crush them with a smile ; 
If you can chain pale passion 

And keep your lips from guile ; 

Then bless the hand that crowned you 

Remembering, as you go, 
'T was not your own endeavor 
That shaped your nature so ; 
' And sneer not at the weakness 
Which made a brother fall. 
For the hand that lifts the fallen 
God loves the best of all ! 

And pray for the wretched prisoners 

All over the land to - day, 
That a holy hand in pity 

Alay wipe their guilt away. 

These verses appeared first in the Rochester Union 
^Advertise?', in February, 1867. A few months since 
they were sent to the Chicago Tribune, as the production 
of an inmate of the penitentiary at JoHet, and were pub- 
hshed with a paragraph recognizing their- deep feeUng, 
and speaking of the fictitious convict -poet as worthy a 
better fate. The Tribunes indignation on learning how 
it had been deceived, was forcibly expressed, and its sober 
second thought as to the convict's worthiness, did not 
flatter him. 



14 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Mrs. Smith's faith in God is well-nigh unquestion- ; 

ing. She rarely doubts that whatever He does is right. ■ 

Out of her faith, her full, implicit trust in divine wisdom, \ 

this song of comfort grew : j 

SOMETIME. :j 

Sometime, when all life's lessons have been learned, ' 

And sun and stars forevermore have set, '■ 

The things which our weak judgments here have spurned, \ 

The things o 'er which we grieved with lashes wet, i 

Will flash before us, out of life's dark night, !' 

As stars shine most in deeper tints of blue ; ''\ 

And we shall see how all God's plans are right, \ 

And how what seemed reproof was love most true. 1 

And we shall see how, while we frown and sigh, • 

God's plans go on as best for you and me ; . 

How, when we called, He heeded not our cry, ^ ' 

Because His wisdom to the end could see. \ 

And e 'en as prudent parents disallow ; 

Too much of sweet to craving babyhood, J 

So God, perhaps, is keeping from us now ^- 

Life's sweetest things, because it seemeth good.' • \ 

And if, sometimes, commingled with life's wine, 

We find the wormwood, and rebel and shrink, \ 

Be sure a wiser hand than yours or mine j 

Pours out this potion for our lips to drink. 
And if some friend we love is lying low, 

Where human kisses cannot reach his face, i 

Oh, do not blame the loving Father so, I 

But wear your sorrow with obedient grace ! :j 



MA Y RILE V SMITH. j 5 

And you shall shortly knov/ that lengthened breath 

Is not the sweetest gift God sends His friend, 
And that, sometimes, the sable pall of death 

Conceals the fairest boon His love can send. 
If we could push ajar the gates of life, 

And stand within and all God's workings sse, 
We could interpret all this doubt and strife. 

And for each mystery could find a key ! 

But not to-day. Then be content, poor heart \ 

God's plans like lilies pure and white unfold. 
We must not tear the close - shut leaves apart, 

Time will reveal the calyxes of gold. 
And if, through patient toil, we reach the land 

Where tired feet, with sandals loosed, may rest. 
When we shall clearly know and understand, 

I think that we will say, " God knew the best !" 

Mrs, Helen Hunt ( ''H.H.") has been credited 
with this, but unjustly. In response to our query of veri- 
fication, Mrs. Smith said: "Yes, I wrote 'Sometime' 
on the cars one day, journeying along from Chicago to 
Springfield. It was suggested by the conversation of a 
lady and gentleman occupying seats in front of me. She 
held in her hand the portrait of a lovely child, and some- 
times kissed it, and as she talked of the little one her 
tears fell like rain. I grew sober and sad, and drew my 
pencil from my pocket and wrote out my thoughts on a 
piece of crumpled paper. '' 

Ver)' different from the foregoing, yet not less illus- 



1 6 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

txative of Mrs. Smith's hope and faith, is this prophetic 
vision of a day to come : 

HIS NAME SHALL BE IN THEIR FOREHEADS. 

When I shall go where my Redeemer is, 

In the far city on the other side, 
And at the threshold of His palaces 

Shall loose my sandals, ever to abide ; 
I know my Heavenly King will smiling wait 
To give me welcome as I touch the gate. 

O joy ! O bliss ! for I shall see His face, 

And wear His blessed name upon my brow ! 

The name that stands for pardon, love, and grace 
That name before which every knee shall bow. 

No music half so sweet can ever be 

As that dear name which He shall write for me ! 

Crowned with this royal signet, I shall walk 

With lifted forehead through the eternal street ; 

And with a holier mien, and gentler talk, 
Will tell my story to the friends I meet — 

Of how the King did stoop His name to write 

Upon my brow, in characters of light ! 

Then, till I go to meet my Father's smile, 

I *11 keep my forehead smooth from passion's scars, 

From angry frowns that trample and defile, 
And every sin that desecrates or mars ; 

That I may lift a face unflushed with shame, 

Whereon my Lord may write His holy name. 

There are some who believe that nothing is truly 
poetical in which the heart shows chiefly. We do not 



MA V RILE V SMITH. j y 

estimate poets by this rule. It would rob Burns, and 
Byron, and Moore, and Hood of half or all their laurels. 
Poetry begotten of passion is evei debasing; poetry born 
of real heartfulness ennobles always and uplifts. May 
Riley Snrnth, then, is a truer poet than is Swinburne, be- 
cause truer to the purest instincts of the soul; and Long- 
fellow and Bryant are not truer than she, unless they have 
made deeper impress on the heart of humanity. 





LEWIS J. BATES. 



N the pleasant city of Detroit, Mich. , there lives 
one whose songs have been sung as widely as 
those of any other Newspaper Poet in the coun- 
Sung literally — sung by singers in homes without 
number — for many of them have been wedded to music, 
and are favorites wherever tender and pure poetic senti- 
ment is regarded, as it should always be, as essential in a 
ballad as pleasing melody. One of these oft-sung songs 
is the waif of this chapter. It has been going the rounds 
for about fifteen years ; and probably not one in a hund- 
red of those editors who annually give it out as * 'copy, '* 
know it was written by a brother editor, or even know 
the writer's name. 

UNDER THE ICE. 

Under the ice the waters run ; 

Under the ice our spirits lie ; 
The genial glow of the summer sun 

Shall loosen their fetters by-and-by. 
Moan and groan in thy prison cold, 

River of life — river of love ; 
The winter is growing worn and old, 
The frost is leaving the melting mold, 

And the sun shines bright above. 



20 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Under the ice — under the snow, 

Our lives are bound in a crystal ring ; 
By-and-by will the south wind blow, 

And roses bloom on the banks of spring. 
Moan and groan in thy fetters strong, 

River of life — river of love ! 
The nights gi'ow short — the days grow long, 
Weaker and weaker the bonds of wrong. 

And the sun shines bright above. 

Under the ice our souls are hid ; 

Under the ice our good deeds grow ; 
Men but credit the wrong we did — 

Never the motive that lay below. 
Moan and groan in thy prison cold, 

River of life — river of love ! 
The winter of life is growing old. 
The frost is leaving the melting mold, 

And the sun shines warm above. 

Under the ice we hide our wrong — 

Under the ice that has chilled us through ! 
O, that the friends who have known us long 

Dare to doubt we are good and true ! 
Moan and groan in thy prison cold, 

River of life — river of love ! 
The winter is growing worn and old. 
The roses stir in the melting mold ; 

We shall be known above ! 

It is such a poem as nearly every one will read ; and 
every one M^ho reads it will like it, though all might not 
be able to tell why. In a manner just vague and general 
enough to cover all individualities, it expresses the uni- 



LEWIS J. BATES. 21 

versal longing for fuller recognition, for a more sunny 
atmosphere, a more generous judgment. Each soul feels 
in some way shut in from that free and glad development 
which seems possible, and each catches in the poet's utter- 
ance some echo of its own unanswered speech. It is at 
once a complaint and a rejoicing — a complaint over that 
which is and ought not to be ; a rejoicing over that which 
is not but is sure to come. And in this it is strikingly 
characteristic of its author. He has written much, and 
there is great diversity manifest in his choice of themes, 
and in his lines of thought, but he oftenest recognizes the 
woe of to-day, and the want of to-day, and sings sweetest 
and longest of the betterment to-morrow wdll bring. 
Lewis J. Bates is peculiarly the poet of Hope. That 
sweet gospel of good in the future, his muse is continu- 
ally preaching. Blessed are they who hear, if so be they 
are discouraged and doubting, and are led up to a 
stronger faith ! 

Mr. Bates was born on the 21st of September, 1832, 
in the Catskill Mountain House, though he laughingly 
asserts that he never killed a cat in his life. His father 
was proprietor of the hotel, and if he possessed any poet- 
ical tendencies they must have manifested themselves in 
his choice of a location for hotel-keeping. His father — 
the grandfather of our poet — was Judge Bates, of Canan- 
daigua, a local politician of some note, a fact which may 
account for Mr. Bates' political affinities, if there be any- 
thing in the doctrine of ^'natural selection," or hereditary 



22 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

talent. The ' 'maternal grandfather" was one oi the quite 
celebrated Tappan family, of five brothers, of whom Ar- 
thur and Lewis — prominent in the anti-slavery move- 
ment — were most widely known. 

When Lewis was two years old his parents removed 
from the wild grandness of the Catskills to the dull level 
of Hopewell, Ontario county, New York, where they lived 
six years, and where they saw both prosperity and advers- 
ity. His father went into the milling business there, 
succeeded handsomely, and became owner of three flour- 
ing mills. Then two of these were destroyed by fire with- 
in a fortnight, and Mr. Bates was a poor man. From 
Hopewell the family removed to Portland, Ionia county, 
Michigan, and settled on a farm in what was then an al- 
most unbroken wilderness,- The father died in a few 
months, and the mother was left a widow with seven 
children, on a farm but partially cleared, in a new settle- 
ment, with no near relative in the State except the family 
of her husband's brother, left in the same sad situation 
by that brother's death a year earlier. 

There were no schools about, save one in a little log 
hut, a mile and a-half distant, through the woods. That 
Lewis attended two or three winters, and afterward went 
to one somewhat better, in the hamlet of Portland. Thus 
his early educational advantages were meager enough. 
The whole family * 'roughed it" for several years, and en- 
joyed few of the comforts of life. 

On attaining his twelfth year Lewis went with his 



LEWIS y. BATES. 23 

grandfather to Akron, Ohio, riding much of the distance 
in the saddle, and as they went in the spring when the 
rivers were high and the swamps full, and as bridges were 
few and miles of * 'corduroy" road numerous, the journey 
was one to be remembered. At Akron he remained 
about eighteen months, as errand boy in the counting- 
house of Rattle & Tappan, studied algebra at odd hours, 
and attended an academy one term of eleven weeks. And 
this summed up his "schooling," with the exception of 
ten weeks more at an academy in Geneva. 

He entered a printing ofiice, then, however — a prac- 
tical school which has graduated many of our best schol- 
ars, — and there acquired more than many academic 
terms could have taught him. Having entered the Cou- 
rier office, in Geneva, New York, as an apprentice, he 
soon got an inkling of the printer s art, and formed a 
liking for it which invariably lasts. But he was not des- 
tined to stick quietly at the case. Out one night with 
some older typos, "cooning," — ^which generally means 
stealing fruit, — he caught the small pox by landing under 
the window of a room in the hotel where a man lay ill 
of it, and caine near dying. IMeantime his mother had 
re-married, and when he was well again he returned to 
frontier life in IMichigan, learned brick-making, then 
surveying, and at last drifted once more into a printing 
office. 

This was in 1848, and the office was that of The 
Eagle, in Grand Rapids — a sheet which was issued weekly 



24 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

whenever its proprietors could raise money enough to 
buy paper. When they could not it suspended, we have 
been told, and they ''passed around the hat." It is now 
a flourishing and well-to-do daily. In this office Mr. 
Bates first began to write for the press, and within the 
next decade he wrote many poems for The Eagle which 
were widely copied, and it is safe to say that the name 
of that paper — for editors would sometimes credit — went 
further on the wings of his rhyme than it ever did other- 
wise. 

But a restless disposition forbade permanency, and 
a year from the time he entered The Eagle office he was a 
sailor on Lake Michigan, engaged with another young 
man in running a coaster ; and in a year or two of such 
life he had some wild experiences. Two years subse- 
quently he was in New York City, sticking type in the 
establishment of John A. Gray & Co. , and thence, in 
about a year, he went into the publishing office of the 
Anti-Slavery Society, under the auspices of Lewis Tappan, 
and there came in contact with many who were then and 
afterward celebrated. While there he became a regular 
poetical contributor to the Knickerbocker Magazine, at 
that time under the management of Mr. Clark, and the 
bright light in our periodical literature. 

In 1853 he returned to Michigan and The Eagle ; 
but soon changed to The Enquirer, on which he took his 
first regular editorial position as * ' Local. " Subsequently 
he served for a time in the same capacity on the Madison, 



LEWIS 7. BATES. 25 

Wisconsin, Journal, and other papers in that State and 
Michigan, varying his labors by work at the case and at 
the press. Through a large part of 1859 ^^ worked a 
large hand press four days and two nights each week, re- 
gardless of his health, and a few months later, after expos- 
ure in the lumber forests, was prostrated with fever, and 
reached town and attendance more dead than alive, after 
twelve days of suffering. Previously in splendid physical 
condition, and skilled in athletic arts — an expert swords- 
man, and a good wrestler and runner — he has never since 
been strong — never since known really good health. 

His first step on recovering from this illness, was to 
re-enter The Eagle office, now as poHtical editor; his 
next, to marry. He remained with The Eagle all through 
the war, and during that time wrote many of his best 
lyrics, several of which were seized upon by composers 
and sent out again in sheet-music form, as "Under the 
Ice" had been, written several years before. 

One of the finest of these lyrics written in war-time, 
though hardly to be classed as a war lyric, is the follow- 
ing, entitled 

BY-AND-BY. 

Under the snow are the roses of June, 
Cold in our bosoms the hopes of our youth ; 

Gone are the wild birds that warbled in tune, 

Mute are the lips that have pledged us their truth. 

Wind of the winter night, lonely as I, 

Wait we the dawn of the bright by-and-by. 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

Roses shall bloom again, 
Sweet love cvill come again : 
It will be summer time, by and by. 

Patience and toil are the meed of to-day — 

Toil without recompense, patience in vain ; 
Darkness and terror lie thick on our way, 

Our footsteps keep time with the angel of pain. 
"Wind of the winter night, far in the sky, 
Watch for the day-star of dear by and-by. 
Parched lips shall quaff again, 
Sad souls shall laugh again : 
Earth will be happier, by- and by. 

Cruel and cold is the judgment of man, 

Cruel as winter, and cold as the snow ; 
But by-and by will the deed and the plan 

Be judged by the motive that lieth belov/. 
Wail of the winter wind, echo our cry. 
Pray for the dawn of the sweet by-and-by, 
When hope shall spring again ; 
When joy shall sing again ; 
Truth will be verified, by-and by. 

Weary and heartsick we totter along. 

Feeble the back, though the burden is large ; 
Broken the purpose, and hushed is the song : 

Why should we linger on life's little marge ? 
Wind of the winter night, hush ! and reply: 
Is there, oh ! is there a glad by and-by ? 
Will dark grow bright again, 
Burdens grow light again. 
And faith be justified, by-and by ? 

Dreary and dark is the midnight of war, 
Distant and dreamy the triumph of right ; 




'^mM 



" Roses shall bloom again, 
Sweet, love will come again : 
It will be summer-time, by and by. 



Page 26. 



LEWIS J. BATES. 27 

Homes that are desolate, hearts that are sore, 

Soon shall the morning star gladden our sight. 
"Wail of the winter wind, so like a sigh, 
Herald the dawn of the blest by-and-by. 

Freedom shall reign again, 

Peace banish pain again ; 
Right will be glorified, by-and-by. 

Three or four composers married this to melody, and 
it was published in various parts of the country, under as 
many different titles. One edition, with music by the 
author of this sketch, was and is issued by Mr. Joseph P. 
Shaw, Music Publisher, Rochester, N. Y., and is known 
by many as "Roses will Bloom Again." 

For the last nine or ten years Mr. Bates has been 
upon the staff of The Post, Detroit, as political editor. 
Though the surroundings of such a position are by no 
means conducive to poetic sentiment, his keeps as fresh 
and pure as ever, and though he writes less, perhaps, 
than he used to, that which he writes has the same sweet- 
ness as had earlier efforts. He yearly writes the Carrier's 
Address for The Post, and the Job Department of that 
large printing concern decks it out in all the graces of 
"the art preservative," and the poem is annually worthy 
of its dress. The Address proper is usually supplemented 
by a brief lyric, on the cover's last page, and that of one 
year w^e copy : 

RIGHT CAN AFFORD TO WAIT, 
Sore hearts, from passion too intense. 
And sinews stiff with pain, 



28 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Whose faith in speedy recompense 
Has proved once more in vain, 

Though Wrong may sway the world to-day, 

You hold the hand of Fate : 
Your good seed grows beneath the snows : 
Right can afford to wait. 

Unwise alike are cold despair 

And hot and angry fire ; 
His patience answers eager prayer, 
His calmness quick desire ; 

His harvest grows beneath the snows, 

And ripens soon or late : 
Tho' Wrong may sway the world to-day, 
Right can afford to wait. 

Still brightly burning in the skies, 
The stars of Freedom shine ; 
There is no zenith for their rise. 
Nor nadir of decline. 

Lo ! in our past how sure and fast 
Has Progress built her state ! 
Wrongf's ancient sway is weak to-day : 
Right can afford to wait, 

Then let none hai'bor groundless fear 

Our hope shall pass away : 

Up ! all who wait the Promised Year, 

And make that year to-day ! 

The strong hand still and earnest will 

May storm the throne of Fate ! 
Right waits for man to build her plan : 
God has no need to wait. 

Mr. Bates is a perfect master of versification. Look- 



LEWIS y. BATES, 29 

ing through his portfolio, as it has been our privilege and 
pleasure to do in years past, one is surprised at the mani- 
fold forms of verse in which he has molded his thought. 
The poems we have given show how accurate is his versi- 
fying in the soberer styles. He is hardly less happy in a 
rollicking stanza, as in this from ''This Jolly Round 
World": 



O ! Old Father Time grows tender and mellow, 
As, roving the round earth, the sturdy old fellow, 
Year in and year out, keeps going and coming, 
In v/inter's wild wrack and in summer's green blooj 

And he very well knows 

That wherever he goes — 
('T is as plain to be seen as his frosty old nose) — 

In each new-broken fetter 

He reads, like a letter. 
That this jolly round world grows better and better — 
This jolly round world grows better and better. 

Also this, the opening stanza of a song entitled ' ' The 
Master's Gold Year" : 

Some millions of ages ago, you know, 

When Time was a jaunty young beau, you know. 

By command of the crown, 

He was told to write down. 
In an almanac needed to show, you know, 

A statement complete. 

Unspotted and neat. 
Of the years yet to be in our new world below. 



30 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

His verse fairly sings of itself, and seems almost an 
inspiration to any composer. 

In the poems we have quoted there is little of the 
imaginative element, yet Mr. Bates is not without this, as 
some of his longer pieces, which we have not space for, 
well attest. He would succeed finely in an extended de- 
scriptive effort, if he would but make the attempt. But 
his muse in her short flights is mainly sentimental and 
semi-philosophic. A little song entitled "Good Luck'' 
betrays the latter quality. We quote the opening stanza, 
and the chorus : 

O, once in each man's life, at least, 
Good luck knocks at his door ; 
And wit to seize the flitting guest 

Need never hunger more. 
But while the loitering idler waits 

Good luck beside his fire, 
The bold heart storms at fortune's gates, 
And conquers its desire. 

For here 's the secret that doth lurk 

In every grand life's plan : 
His work, it was a man's work ; 
He did it like a man. 

Blessed are they who can sing songs in the night ! 
For nights do come, to us all ; and those who sing in- 
stead of sighing when shadows wait, shall earlier see the 
morning. For such as have no melody in their hearts, 
this bit of cheer was breathed : 



LEWIS y. BATES, 31 

SOME SV/EET DA Y, 
I. 

In every life some rain must beat ; 

In every life some sunshine is ; 
Some early find their share of sweet ; 

Some, longing, wait their bliss. 
Then, sweet, forget our wasted years, 

And mourn no more our vanished May ; 
Be patient till our joy appears, 

Our turn will come some day. ^ 

Some day aU our birds shall sing, 
Some day all our joy-bells ring. 
Some day bloom our promised spring, 
Some day — some sweet day. 

II. 
Oh, vain are sighs for sorrows past, 
And vain are fears for future ill. 
While plighted troth holds sure and fast, 

And love is faithful still. 
Then envy not the happy hearts 

\Yhose crowns of bliss do not delay ; 
The joy late coming late departs, 
And ours will longer stay. 

Some day all our grain shall grow, 
Some day all our roses blow, 
Some day, sweet, our souls shall glow ; 
Some day — some sweet day. 

III. 
The flower of summer's sun and rain 

Is sure to droop in summer's glow ; 
The year's best gift of golden grain 

Lies green beneath the saow. 



32 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Then doubt no more our lives shall bloom, 

For sorrow cannot always stay ; 
And for the happy time to come 
*T will be our turn some day. 

Some day Love shall claim his own, 
Some day Right ascend his throne, 
Some day hidden Truth be known ; 
Some day — some sweet day. 

Half sad in its tender soberness, as much of Mr. 
Bates' verse seems to be, his is by no means a sad nature. 
He is brimming over with humor, and oftentimes keenly 
witty. The comic side of life strikes him with all its 
comicality. Those who remember his poem on ''De- 
cember," published in all the papers a matter of fifteen 
years ago— a poem whose humor was broad in the ex- 
treme — would hardly believe the same hand penned 
"Under the Ice," unless they realized how near the sur- 
face of laughter flows ever an undertone of tears. Many 
of his pointed witticisms sparkle forth brilliantly in The 
Post, and he wastes a wealth of bon mots in every-day con- 
versation. All poets may not be possessed of warm 
geniality, but those of our acquaintance offer no excep- 
tion to what we would fain believe a general rule ; and, 
in the main, those whose productions seem saddest, in 
the tenderest minor key, are those whose geniality is most 
warm and contagious, who appear overflowing with happy 
fancies and real light-heartedness. 

In person Mr. Bates is somewhat slight, of about 
medium height, with bright, laughing eyes looking out 



LEWIS y. BATE 3. 33 

from under a broad forehead, nearly naked of "thatch." 
He is of an intensely active, nervous organization, as 
might be inferred from the sketch of his life, and has 
crowded more varied experience and hard work into forty 
years than many men can boast of. He writes rapidly — 
has written much in the way of sketches and stories, as 
well as poetry ; and his prose has a pithy directness well 
fitted for journalistic effect. He has conquered success 
as a political writer ; but it is as the poet that we like best 
to regard him, and especially as the poet of Hope. And 
as such we cannot more fitly take leave of him than by 
quoting this hopeful poem : 

OUR BETTER DAV. 

Still sore with struggle, faint and worn, 

We wait the better day, 
The breath of whose celestial morn 

Shall charm our pain away ; 
Our night seems long, and dark with wrong 

And evil life's whole sura ; 
But God's time is our promised time. 

And that is sure to come. 

O ! soul that struggles and that cries, 

Sore tempted to despair, 
And reads no answer in the skies 

To labor or to prayer : 
Though night is old, and dark, and cold, 

And doubting lips are dumb, 
Yet God's day is your triumph day, 

And that is sure to come. 
3 



34 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

O ! day long looked for, oft foretold, 

Best theme of prayer and song, 
When Truth and Right shall judgment hold, 

In triumph over Wi'ong ! 
Young lives wear out 'twixt hope and doubt, 

Young hearts grow cold and numb ; 
But God's day is our promised day, 

And that is sure to come. 

How many times, 'mid icy chills. 

We 've dreamed of summer blooms, 
And woke to snow on wintry hills, 

And frost on early tombs ; 
Our birds of song are silent long, 

The leafless groves are dumb ; 
But God's time is our summer time, 

And that is sure to come. 

We waited — not with folded hands — 

To gather fortune's grain ; 
With patient toil we plowed our lands, 

And scattered seed like rain ; 
The year goes wrong, and tares grow strong, 

Hope starves without a crumb ; 
But God's time is our harvest time. 

And that is sure to come. 




BENJAMIN F, TAYLOR. 

ECTURE audiences, in many sections of the 
Middle and Western States, know well a form 
of medium height, rather heavier than the aver- 
age, surmounted by a large head set squarely on broad 
shoulders, the head lightly covered with iron-gray hair, 
thrown back from a forehead massive and intellectual, 
and crowning a face somewhat florid, smoothly-shaven, 
happy in its smile when the smile comes, strongly pro- 
nounced in its character, and the tell -tale of perhaps fifty 
years since a mother first looked into it and knew her 
first-born. Lecture audiences have often seen this form 
walking half -timidly for\vard to the speaker's desk, — half- 
timidly, as though afraid to meet the gaze of hundreds ; 
half- hurriedly, as though in haste to be over with a 
dreaded duty — have often listened to the rare poetry of 
prose to which the form gave utterance, in speech quick 
and impetuous as the fancy it syllabled, and have often 
gone home wondering how a man could crowd so much 
of quaint conceit, of beautiful simile, of brilliant imagin- 
ation, of pleasant humor, of tender sentiment and fine 
word paintmg, into an hour's discourse. The name of 
this form is Benjamin F, Taylor. 



^6 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

In one of his lectures, — that on "Motive Powers," — 
Mr. Taylor has given the story of what is probably the 
most widely known waif in the language — a little poem 
which every paper in the country has printed, — and many 
of them a score of times — which every lover of poetry has 
read and re-read, which goes about under numerous 
names, and which has suggested more imitations, and 
been more frequently plagiarized, than any other bit of 
sentiment with which we are acquainted. 

"Twenty years ago," the story runs, "on a dreary 
December evening, I sat in an upper room in the great 
metropolis, by the side of a sick girl. Not long before 
I had pledged to her all that a man can pledge to his 
heart's choice. Now in her need I lacked the means to 
give her proper care and comfort. From a city hundreds 
of miles away had come a demand for one of those com- 
monly mechanical things known as New Year's Addresses. 
It was a question of poetry and bread, or no poetry and 
no bread. Fifty dollars was the motive power. I wrote 
the Address as desired, and these verses were part of it : 

THE LONG AGO. 

A wonderful stream is the River Time, 

As it runs through the realm of Tears, 
With a faultless rhythm, and a musical rhyme, 
And a broader sweep, and a surge sublime 

As it blends with the ocean of Years. 

How the winters are drifting like flakes of snow ! 
And the summers like buds between r 



BENJAMIN F. TA YLOR. ^j 

And the year in the sheaf — so they come and they go 
On the River's breast with its ebb and its flow, 
As they glide in the shadow and sheen. 

There 's a magical isle up the River Time, 

Where the softest of airs are playing ; 
There 's a cloudless sky and a tropical clime. 
And a voice as sweet as a vesper chime, 

And the Junes with the roses are staying. 

And the name of the isle is the Long Ago, 

And we bury our treasures there ; 
There are brows of beauty and bosoms of snow — 
They are heaps of dust, but we loved them so ! — 

There are trinkets, and tresses of hair. 

There are fragments of song that nobody sings, 

And a part of an infant's prayer ; 
There 's a harp unswept, and a lute without strings, 
There are broken vows and pieces of rings. 

And the garments that she used to wear ! 

There are hands that are waved when the fairy shore 

By the mirage is lifted in air ; 
And we sometimes hear through the turbulent roar 
Sweet voices we heard in the days gone before, 

When the wind down the River is fair. 

Oh ! remembered for aye be the Blessed Isle, 

All the days of our life, till night ! 
When the evening comes, with its beautiful smile. 
And our eyelids are closing in slumber awhile. 

May that " Greenwood " of soul be in sight. 

We believe Benjamin F. Taylor was born at Low- 
ville, Lewis county, N. Y. , where his father, Prof. Stephen 



38 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

W. Taylor, was several years engaged in teaching. He 
early manifested poetic genius, though how he came by 
such inheritance was and ever has been a puzzling ques- 
tion to all familiar with his parentage. His mother dis- 
played no poetic gifts, though she was one of those true 
womanly women who make homelife almost a poem in 
itself — such an one as memory holds immortal while 
daisies blossom over her grave, — one whom the poet 
might well recall as he did in "The Child and the Star" — 

heart of the house, my dead mother ! 
Give your boy the old greeting once more, 

That I never have heard from another 
Since Death was let in at the door. 

1 can reach up my hand to the ceiling 

Of the rooms once the vi^orld's greater part — 
Who wonders I cannot help feeling 

They have narrowed to fit to my heart ! 

His father, though possessed of strong intellect, and very 
liberal culture, had nothing whatever of the poetic in- 
stinct, and was, in fact, as directly the opposite of our 
subject in character and habit as can be imagined. He 
was mathematically precise in all things, as rigid a stick- 
ler for discipline in thought and action as was ever known. 
He had literally no poetry in his soul. The most poet- 
ical features or events he would strip of their beauty, and 
make of them plain, precise, angular facts. On the other 
hand, his son clothes the homeliest hint or happening in 
poetic garb, wraps it in a metaphor, or decks it out with 
fancy, until it fairly blossoms into song. 



BENJAMIN F. TA YLOR. 39 

When Benjamin F. and his brother Alfred were half- 
grown lads, Prof. Taylor removed to Hamilton, Madison 
county, N. Y., to become Principal of the Preparatory 
Department of the institution now known as Madison 
University, of which institution he ultimately became 
President, and in which his sons were mainly educated. 
As a scholar Benjamin F. was not remarkable. His 
mental make-up was not that of the close, plodding stu- 
dent. He was discursive, and liked rambling off into 
new paths, as was shown by his preparing a little volume, 
while in college, entitled ''The Attractions of Language," 
his first venture in authorship. It was brought out in 
Hamilton, and much of it was written under pressure of 
the printer, the author's characteristic of procrastination 
in literary work cropping out at the very beginning. 

His earliest poetical effort of any moment was, if we 
mistake not, a long poem written for delivery before some 
society, in w^hich occurred this original and fanciful ex- 
planation of the Northern Lights : 

To claim the Arctic came the sun, 
With banners of the burning zone. 
Unrolled upon their airy spars, 
They froze beneath the light of stars ; 
And there they float, those streamers old, 
Those Northern Lights, forever cold ! 

After leaving college INIr. Taylor taught school 
awhile, in various places in Central New York ; married, 
at length ; tried literature in New York, but with poor 



40 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

success ; and finally wei t to Chicago and became con- 
nected with The Evening journal, of that city, as literary 
editor and contributor. His short, suggestive, often 
quaint and pithy articles in that paper soon attracted at- 
tention, and some of them were widely copied by the 
Press. They were presently collected in a modest volume 
entitled "January and June,'' which has more genuine 
poetry of thought in its two hundred and odd pages than 
can be found anywhere else in the same space, to our 
knowledge. In that volume appears what is probably 
the best thing Mr. Taylor ever wrote — a poem only less 
generally known and admired than the waif before spok- 
en of, and having more artistic merit than any other from 
Mr. T.'s pen. It closes a little raphsody on "Bugs and 
Beauties," in which the real theme is Nature's coloring. 
Speaking of what glory-tints the evening shows, in the 
midst of description our writer glides away into memory: 

"On such a night, in such a June, who has not sat, 
side by side, with somebody for all the world like 'Jenny 
June' 1 May be it was years ago ; but it was some time. 
May be you had quite forgotten it ; but you will be the 
better for remembering. May be she has 'gone on be- 
fore, ' where it is June all the year long, and never Janu- 
ary at all ; but God forbid ! There it was, and then it 
was, and thus it was : 

THE BE A UTIFUL RIVER. 

Like a foundling in slumber the Summer-day lay, 
On the crimsoning thrf^shold of Even, 



BENJAMIN F. TAYLOR. 41 

And I thought that the glow from the azure-arched way 
Was a glimpse of the coming of Heaven. 

There together we sat by the beautiful stream ; 

We had nothing to do but to love and to dream 
In the days that have gone on before. 

These are not the same days, though they bear the same 
name 
With the ones I shall welcome no more. 

But it may be the angels are culling them o'er, 

For a Sabbath and Summer forever, 
When the years shall forget the Decembers they wore. 

And the shroud shall be woven, no, never ! 
In a twilight like that, Jenny June for a bride, 
Oh ! what more of the world could one wish for beside, 

As we gazed on the river unrolled. 
Till we heard, or we fancied, its musical tide, 

As it flowed through the gateway of gold. 

"Jenny June," then I said, "let us linger no more 

On the banks of the beautiful river ; 
Let the boat be unmoored, and be muffled the oar. 

And we '11 steal into heaven together. 
If the angel on duty our coming descries. 
You have nothing to do but throw off the disguise 

That you wore when you wandered with me. 
And the sentry shall say * Welcome back to the skies, 

We have long been awaiting for thee.' " 

Oh ! how sweetly she spoke ere she uttered a word. 
With that blush partly hers, partly Even's ; 

And that tone like the dream of a song we once heard, 
As she whispered, " That way is not heaven's ; 

For the river that runs by the realms of the blest 



43 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Has no song on its ripple, no star on its breast — 

Oh ! that river is nothing like this ! 
For it glides on in shadow, beyond the w^orld's west, 

Till it breaks into beauty and bliss !" 

I am lingering yet, but I linger alone, 

On the banks of the beautiful river ; 
'T is the twin of that day, but the wave where it shone 

Bears the willow tree's shadow forever ! 

In the volume named, there are several fragments of 
verse, in each of which some beautiful thought shines 
out, and half-a-dozen poems grown to the dignity of a 
name and meriting a reprint here did space permit. Of 
the fragments, here is one about the dawning of Liber- 
ty's Day, which has the real lyric ring : 

Oh ! wild was that dawning ! No welcome of words 

No star to foretell it — no warbling of birds — 

No fading of shadows — no murmur of rills — 

No flashing of pinions— no flushing of hills ; 

But the day broke in thunder o'er land and o'er sea, 

And from cloud and from shroud rang the song of the Free. 

Oh ! that song of wrought-iron no bard could have made. 

With its surging of banner and gleaming of blade ; 

With its column of cloud and its pillar of flame. 

And the clods 'neath the dead turned the color of fame ! 

Here is another, which pictures the going away of a 
loved one, never to return : 

The sky was all beauty, the world was all bliss — 
Oh ! who would not pray for an ending like this ? 



BENJAMIN F. TA YLOR. 43 

So my beautiful May passed away from life's even ; 
So the blush of her being was blended with heaven ; 
So the bird of my bosom fluttered up to the dawn — 
A window was opened — my darling was gone ! 
A truant from time, from tears and from sin, 
For the angel on watch took the wanderer in. 

Of the full - fledged poems, one is familiar to school- 
boys, from often finding place in school -readers, and is 
frequently brought into use for purposes of declamation. 
Barring some faults of rhythm, its lyrical effect is very fine. 
It sings of our national banner, and is entitled 

GOD BLESS OUR STARS FOREVER. 

"God bless our Stars forever!" 

Thus the Angels sang sublime, 
When round God's forges fluttered fast 

The sparks of starry Time ! 
When they fanned them with their pinions, 

Till they kindled into day, 
And revealed Creation's bosom 

Where the infant Eden lay. 

" God bless our stars forever !" 

Thus they sang, the seers of old, 
When they beckoned to the morning 

Through the Future's misty fold ; 
When they waved the wand of wonder — 

When they breathed the magic word — 
And the pulses' golden glimmer 

Showed the waking Granite heard. 

" God bless our stars forever ! " 
' T is the burden of the song, 



44 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

Where the sail through hollow midnight 

Is flickering along ; 
When a ribbon of blue Heaven 

Is a-gleaming through the clouds, 
With a star or two upon it 

For the sailor in the shrouds I 

"God bless our stars forever!" 

It is Liberty's refrain, 
From the snows of wild Nevada 

To the sounding woods of Maine ; 
Where the green Multnomah wanders, 

Where the Alabama rests — 
Where the Thunder shakes his turbans 

Over Alleghany's crests. 



Oh ! it waved above the Pilgrims 

On the pinions of their prayer ; 
Oh ! it billowed o'er the battle 

On the surges of the air ; 
Oh ! the stars have risen in it 

Till the Eagle waits the sun. 
And Freedom from her mountain watch 

Has counted " Thirty-one." 

When the weary years are halting, 

In the mighty march of Time, 
And no New ones throng the threshold 

Of its corridoi's sublime ; 
When the clarion call "Close up !" 

Rings along the line no more. 
Then adieu, thou Blessed Banner, 

Then adieu, and not before ! 



BENJAAIIN F. TA YLOR, 45 

Vv'e have not room for the entire poem, but its spirit 
can be caught from these stanzas, which are the best. 
From a poem of some length, entitled ''Broken Memo- 
ries in Broken Rhymes, " inscribed to his brother Alfred, 
we make this extract : 

Oh ! they tell us of the future, of purer lives, and perfect 

men, 
But I should n't wonder, brother, we were nearer Heaven 

then ; 
If by life's wild tempest driven, that sweet port we 've 

drifted past. 
Oh ! send a pilot, gentle Heaven, to bring us back at last ! 

From home to home, my brother ! Oh ! how breathless 

were the bliss. 
To be the boys together there — in that world as in this ! 
Methought I heard a hail, brother, and it syllabled my 

name ; 
Oh ! ship your oar a moment, let us listen whence it came. 

There away, like moonlight breaking, something dawn- 
ing through the dark ! 

Now the shadow shape is taking, — sail of silver ! silver 
barque ! 

In the bow there stands an angel, and a cherub by her 
side ; 

And that cherub, trust me, brother, is the little boy that 
died. 

Angel? No ! But wife and woman ; she that looked me 

into love. 
While below she sweetly waited for her wings, and went 

above. 



46 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Had I seen through her disguising, could I so have 

loved and mourned? 
Oh ! that loving, and that weeping, would have been to 

woi'ship turned. 

As a maiden at her window, watches Love's pale planet 

rise, 
So m.y Mary's soul was watching, ever watching, at her 

eyes ; 
As that maiden, footsteps hearing, from the darkened 

window flying. 
So some angel, earthward nearing, lured my Mary into 

dying ! 

Mr. Taylor was called into the lecture field when 
lectures first began to be popular, and soon became a fa- 
vorite with the public. It was not any grace of oratory 
which won him regard, for as an orator he does not excel. 
His rare power of pleasing, when upon the rostrum, does 
not lie in address, although he is by no means an un- 
pleasant speaker. The charm is in the thought, not in 
the style of its utterance. He reads his lectures at a 
galloping rate, with little regard for elocutionary effect, 
hardly pauses to take breath, and scarcely gives oppor- 
tunity for proffered applause. ' Simile, metaphor, senti- 
ment, roll off his tongue in such quick succession that 
one has barely time to realize the beauty of each ; and 
audiences go away in a daze of splendid rhetoric, unable 
to recall half the beauties of thought with which the hour 
has overflowed, — not vastly instructed, perhaps, but with 
a very satisfying memory of the hour and the man. 



BENJAMIN F. TA YLOR. 47 

We doubt if there lives another, accustomed to pub- 
lic appearance, who is so keenly sensitive with regard to 
it as IS Benjamin F. Taylor. He is almost morbidly sen> 
sitive, indeed, and suffers from his sensitiveness to a de- 
gree that would surprise phlegmatic people. His mood 
is as variable as the mercury in a barometer, and goes up 
or down in sympathy with the atmosphere of circumstance 
and occasion. He can never get over what is known 
among speakers as stage fright, and has been known ut- 
terly to refuse giving his lecture, at the last moment, 
simply because his mood had suddenly sunk, and over- 
apprehension had taken undue hold upon him. 

Mr. Taylor is strongly patriotic. When war came, 
his sympathies were all with "the Boys in Blue." Leav- 
ing his quiet literary labor in The Journal office, aban- 
doning the lecture field, he went with the soldiers of the 
West as their enthusiastic chronicler. In his army cor- 
respondence people were given the finest literature of the 
time. No other letters from the front so perfectly pho- 
tographed army life, in all its varied features. No other 
pictures of war's sorrows and successes were so vivid, so 
intensely real, as were his. He went with the Army of 
the Cumberland, and saw the battles of Mission Ridge 
and Lookout Mountain. How the glory of loyal en- 
deavor lit up his description of those memorable days ! 
Every sentence was eloquent. In the graphic lines he 
drew, one could see the whole panorama of battle unfold. 
The charge, the steady onset, the thundering cannonade, 



48» WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

the roll of musketry, the brave daring, the magniiicent 
victory — all were there. No finer descriptive writing was 
ever done, than Mr. Taylor did in the camp of that suc- 
cessful army whose courage and accomplishments he 
eulogized so well. 

Back again in ways of peace, he told the story of 
Mission Ridge and Lookout Mountain to delighted audi- 
ences, east and west, and finally embodied it in a volume 
bearing that title, which merits lasting place among the 
records of war. Its pictures of army life are well worth 
preserving, while its narrative of victorious battling can 
not be surpassed. 

Mr. Taylor is a perfect artist in words. He picks 
them out, and uses them, with an exquisite regard for 
every shade of meaning. Perhaps this characteristic is 
even more apparent in his prose than in his poetry. His 
thought is a veritable epicure in the choice of syllables ; 
there seems no effort in it all ; the marvelous wealth and 
fitness of syllabic expression is so natural you but half 
appreciate it, at the first. His fancy is quick as the light- 
ning, airy and delicate as gossamer ; his imagination runs 
free as the wind flies, and on its rhythmic feet wanders at 
will over all the fields of thought. Between his luxuri- 
ous taste for words, his rare appreciation of syllabic mean- 
ing, his swift fancy and his lively imagination, he would 
make poetry of the dictionary itself In the commonest 
and most matter-of-fact things he finds poetic hints and 
forms. Ordinary people would see little poetical in a 



BENJAMIN F. TA YLOR. 49 

comet, yet hear him sing of one, after naming it 

THE NEW CRAFT IN THE OFFING. 

'T was a beautiful night on a beautiful deep, 
And the man at the helm had just fallen asleep, 
And the watch on the deck, with his head on his breast, 
Was beginning to dream that another's it pressed. 
When the look-out aloft cried, "A sail ! ho ! a sail !" 
And the question and answer went rattling like hail : 
"A sail ! ho! a sail!" "Where away?" " No'th-no'th- 

west ! " 
" Make her out ? " " No, your honor ! " — the din drowned 

the rest. 

There, indeed, is the stranger, the first in these seas, 
Yet she drives boldly on, in the teeth of the breeze — 
Now her bows to the breakers she steadily turns, 
Oh ! how brightly the light of her binnacle burns ! 
Not a signal for Saturn this Rover has given. 
No salute for our Venus, the flag-star of heaven ; 
Not a rag or a ribbon adorning her spars, 
She has saucily sailed by the red planet Mars ; 
She has " doubled," triumphant, the Cape of the Sun, 
And the sentinel stars, without firing a gun ; 
Now, a flag at the fore and the mizzen unfurled. 
She is bearing right gallantly down on the world ! 
" Helm a-port !" " Show a light ! she will run us aground !" 
"Fire a gun!" "Bring her to !" "Sail ahoy! — whither 
bound?" 

Avast there ! ye lubbers ! Leave the rudder alone ; 
'T is a craft "in commission" — the Admiral's own ; 
And she sails with sealed orders, unopened as yet, 
Though her anchors she weighed before Lucifer set ! 
4 



50 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Ah ! she sails by a chart no draughtsman could make, 
Where each cloud that can trail, and each wave that can 

break , 
Where each planet is cruising, each star is at rest. 
With its anchor "let go" in the blue of the Blest ; 
Where that sparkling flotilla, the Asteroids, lie, 
Where the scai'f of red morning is flung on the sky ; 
Where the breath of the sparrow is staining the aii* — 
On the chart that she bears, you will find them all there ! 
Let her pass on in peace to the port whence she came, 
With her trackings of fire, and her streamers of flame ! 

This poem appeared soon after the great comet of 
1858 blazed forth, and went the rounds. Another, on a 
common-place theme, is almost as much a waif as ''The 
Long Ago," or "The Beautiful River," for like those it 
continually goes around in newspaper columns uncredit- 
ed. It is about 

THE OLD-FASHIONED CHOIR. 
I have fancied, sometimes, the Bethel -bent beam 
That trembled to earth in the patriarch's dream. 
Was a ladder of song in that wilderness rest. 
From the pillow of stone to the blue of the Blest, 
And the angels descending to dwell with us here, 
"Old Hundred," and "Cormth," and "China," and "Mean" 
All the hearts are not dead, not under the sod, 
That those breaths can blow open to Heaven and God ! 
Ah ' "Silver Street" leads by a bright, golden road — 
O ! not to the hyums that in harmony flowed — 
But to those sweet human psalms in the old - fashioned 

choir. 
To the girls that sang alto, the girls that sang air ! 



BENJAMIN F. TAYLOR. 51 

' Let us sing to God's praise," the minister said, 

All the psalm books at once fluttered open at "York," 
Sunned their long dotted wings in the words that he read, 
While the leader leaped into the tune just ahead, 

And politely picked out the key-note with a fork, 
And the vicious old viol went growling along 
At the heels of the girls in the rear of the song. 

I need not a wing — bid no genii come, 

With a wonderful web from Arabian loom, 

To bear me again ^x^ the River of Time, 

When the woi-ld was in rhythm, and life was its rhyme ; 

Where the streams of the year flowed so noiseless and 

narrow, 
That across them there floated the song of a sparrow ; 
For a sprig of green caraway carries me there, 
To the old village church and the old village choir, 
When clear of the floor my feet slowly swung. 
And timed the sweet praise of the songs as they sung. 
Till the glory aslant of the afternoon sun 
Seemed the rafters of gold in God's temple begun ! 

You may smile at the nasals of old Deacon Brown, 
Who followed by scent till he ran the tune down ; 
And the dear sister Green, with more goodness than 

grace, 
Rose and fell on the tunes as she stood in her place, 
And where "Coronation" exultingly flows. 
Tried to reach the high notes on the tips of her toes ! 
To the land of the leal they went with their song, 
Where the choir and the choi-us together belong ; 
O, be lifted, ye gates ! Let me hear them again — 
Blessed song, blessed Sabbath, forever, amen ! 



52 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

We have spoken of Mr. Taylor as an artist in words. 
In prose or verse he paints a picture as few other artists 
can, with a grace of touch and a vividness of color espe- 
cially his own. Here is one of his snow scenes, from 

A WINTER PSALM. 

As softly as on mountain air beatitudes were shed, 
As gently as the lilies bud among the words He said, 
So did the dear old Mountains lay the sparkling M'inter 

down 
Upon the poor dumb bosom of a world so bare and 

brown — 
So noiselessly and silently, such radiance and rest ! 
As if a snowy wing should fold upon a sparrow's breast. 
Far thro' the dim uncertain air, as still as asters blow, 
The downy drowsy feet untold tread out the world we 

know ; ^ 
Upon the pine's green fingers set, flake after flake they 

land. 
And flicker with a feeble light, amid the shadowy band ; 
Upon the meadows broad and brown where maids and 

mowers sung ; 
Upon the meadows gay with gold the dandelions flung ; 
Upon the farmyard's homely realm, on ricks and rugged 

bars, 
Till riven oak and strawy heap were domes and silver 

spars ; 
The cottage was an eastern dream with alabaster eaves ; 
And lilacs growing round about with diamonds for leaves ; 
The well-sweep gray above the roof a silver accent stood, 
And silver willows wept their way to meet a silver wood ; 



BENJAMIN F. TA YLOR. 53 

The russet groves had blossomed white and budded full 
with stars, 

The fences were in uniform, the gate-posts were hussars ; 

The chimneys were in turbans all, with plumes of crimson 
smoke, 

And the costly breaths were silver when the laughing chil- 
dren spoke ; 

And gem and jewel every^vhere along the tethers strung 

Where mantling roses once had climbed and morning 
glories swung. 

So through the dim, uncertain air, as still as asters blow. 

The downy drowsy feet untold tread out the world we 
know. 

In War Time, 1863, Mr. Taylor penned a brief lyric 
entitled ''The Gospel of the Oak," and one may look 
long to find another bit of description so fine as this 
opening sonnet : 

Up to the sun, magnificently near. 

The Lord did build a Californian oak, 
And took no Sabbath to the thousandtli year. 

But builded on until it bravely broke 
Into that realm wherein the morning light 
Walks to and fro upon the top of night ! 
Around that splendid shaft no hammers rang, 
Nor giants wrought, nor truant angels sang. 
But gentle winds and painted birds did bear 
Its corner-stones of glory through the air ; 
Grand volumes green rolled up like cloudy weather, 
And birds and stars went in and out together ; 
When Day on errands from the Lord came down, 
It stepped from Heaven to that leafy crown ! 



54 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Some of Mr. Taylor's contributions to Scrihner's 
Monthly, within the past two years, have been veritable 
gems of descriptive poesy, and have found wide recog- 
nition. He has never been a prolific writer of verse, 
though of late he has written more than formerly. Much 
that he has penned has been in the way of longish poems, 
for special purposes of place and occasion ; and some of 
these, from lack of careful work, have failed to do him 
justice. It is the misfortune of his temperament that he 
must labor under pressure of necessity — or thinks he 
must. Is a lecture to be written, he will wait until only 
a few days before his opening engagement for the season, 
and then dash it off at a heat. Is a poem to be deliver- 
ed, likely as not he will pencil it down on bits of old 
letters, in the cars, on his way to the place of delivery. 

As a natural consequence, there is often apparent 
lack of continuity of thought and idea, in his longer 
poems, as there is also, often, in his lectures. Yet fre- 
quent reading and careful search will always show that 
there is a logical connection of idea, and that the abrupt- 
ness is more seeming than actual. The fault lies in a 
want of care for details, — for the rounding out and link- 
ing in of thought and idea, for the perfection of rhythm, 
which give finish and symmetry. But even the severest 
critic can not find fault with Mf. Taylor long at a tim^\ 
His rare conceits, his unequaled daintiness of touch, his 
close sympathy, his intense love for the human, his pei- 
fection of color, his wonderful appreciation of old-time 



BENJAMIN F. TAYLOR. 55 

beauties, his unlooked-for quaintness, his strong origin- 
ahty, put criticism quite to flight.. And beHeving with 
him, that song is everlasting, we join in the prayer he 
breathes at the close of his volume of "Old Time Pic- 
tures, " when speaking of 

THE ROSE AND THE ROBIlSr. 

The yellow rose leaves falling down 

Pay golden toll to passing June, 
The robin's breast of golden brown 

Is trembling with an ancient tune. 

The rose will bloom another year, 
The robin and his wife will come, 

But he who sees may not be here, 
And he who sings be dumb. 

Thy grace be mine, oh yellow rose ! 

My heart like thine its blossoms shed. 
Grow fragrant to the fragrant close, 

And sweetest when I 'm dead. 

And so like thee I 'II pay my way 
In coin that time can never rust, 

And footsteps sound another day 
Though feet have turned to dust ^. 

Thy gift be mine, oh singing bird ! 

My song like thine round home and heart ; 
To Song, God never said the word 
" To dust return, for dust thou art 1 * 




ELIZA O, PEIRSON. 

N 1869, soon after Moore's Rural New-Yorker 
was removed to New York City, and while the 
writer of this still remained its Literary Editor, 
there came to our sanctum table a dainty manuscript, 
daintily traced in the well-known hand of an occasional 
contributor. It was just a simple bit of verse, but such 
as always pleases. It made a peculiarly pleasant impres- 
sion on our mind, indeed, because of its perfect sim- 
plicity, its uniqueness. In a few days it saw the light of 
print, and we knew, with a sort of editorial intuition, 
that it would find favor with our brother editors, and go 
the rounds. And such was the case. Originally pub- 
lished under the author's usual nomme de plume of "Ali- 
qua," within three weeks we saw it in a country paper, 
without any recognition of authorship, or any hint of 
credit, whatever ; and ever since then the poem has been 
as veritable a waif as any we have mentioned, finding a 
snug place in numberless newspaper corners, and preach- 
ing its little sermon, of what life and death ought to be, 
to a large audience. It has been included, also, in sev- 
eral compilations of religious rhyme, and has been re- 
peatedly quoted in obituary columns, with special refer- 
ence — a touching memorial of fruitful age. Here it is : 



58 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

RIPE WHEAT. 

We bent to-day o 'er a coffined form, 

And our tears fell softly down ; 
"We looked our last on the aged face, 
With its look of peace, its patient grace, 
And hair like a silver crown. 

We touched our own to the clay-cold hands, 

From life's long labor at rest ; 
And among the blossoms white and sweet, 
We noted a bunch of golden wheat. 
Clasped close to the silent breast. 

The blossoms whispered of fadeless bloom, 

Of a land where fall no tears ; 
The ripe wheat told of toil and care. 
The patient waiting, the trusting prayer, 
The garnered good of the years. 

We knew not what work her hands had found, 
What rugged places at her feet ; 

What cross was hers, what blackness of night ; 

We saw but the peace, the blossoms white, 
And the bunch of ripened wheat. 

As each goes up from the field of earth. 

Bearing the treasures of life, 
God looks for some gathered grain of good. 
From the ripe harvest that shining stood, 

But waiting the reaper's knife. 

Then labor well, that in death you go 

Not only with blossoms sweet, — 
Not bent with doubt, and burdened with fears, 
And dead, dry husks of the wasted years, — 
But laden with golden wheat. 




Iilil 



iiliiiiilliiiiiiulliLl 



ELIZA 0. PEIRSON. 



59 



There are more pretentious poems In Memoriam, 
but none that more beautifully and briefly sum up the 
Mortality and the Hope, than does this sum them up. 
We asked the author once how it came to be written, 
and this was the substance of her reply: "When tell- 
ing me of the death of a mutual acquaintance — a lady 
of lovely character, whose years had numbered four- 
score — a friend said : 'Among the white flowers in her 
coffin was a bunch of ripe wheat, and I thought it most 
beautiful and appropriate.' I penned the lines a few 
days after. " It is thus that from the simplest incident or 
thought of to-day a popular poem springs, to be read 
and re-read by thousands, on the many coming morrows. 

**Aliqua" veils her identity under a nomme de plume 
because in her sensitiveness she does not like to acknowl- 
edge anything she writes. Yet she has written many 
essays and poems of which no young writer, or one 
more mature, need be ashamed, and we feel warranted 
in disclosing her true personality. *'Aliqua," then, is 
Mrs. Lizzie O, Peirson, a young married lady residing 
in Newark, Wayne county, N. Y. Her maiden name 
was Crosby. She was born in Rome, N. Y., if we mis- 
take not, where she passed her childhood, and where she 
was educated. She has the poet's love for by-gone asso- 
ciations, and recurs often to those somewhat monotonous 
yet pleasant landscapes of the upper Mohawk valley. 

" Of all the beautiful pictures 
That hang on memory's wall," 



6o WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

the dearest far, to her, is that of those far-reaching mead- 
ows, where the river winds so quietly between fringing 
willows, as if in no haste to wed the Hudson and go 
shimmering off to the sea. She early manifested a taste 
for writing, and it was when she was only eight or nine 
years old that some friend procured the insertion of one 
of her poetic attemptings in a local paper. From that 
time on she has written more or less for publication, 
mostly for The Rural New-Yorker and The Rural Home. 
She took two or three prizes for composition, while at 
Rome Academy, and won the Abbot Gold Medal for a 
poem entitled * ' Gleams of Light. " 

Mrs. Peirson's love of nature is strong, to intensity, 
and strongly reflective. That she finds frequent inspira- 
tion in field, forest, and flower, and oftenest sings of 
these, is not strange ; and that she catches some hint of 
a life-lesson in every scene she views, does not surprise 
us. What could be more natural, to one of her mental 
cast, looking out upon November's dreariness, than thus 
to muse on 

MIGNONETTE. 
The garden mourns for beauty lost 

Through all its walks and ways, 
And winds in passing hold lament 

For dear dead summer days, 
For faded flowers that lowly lie 

With ghostly leaves, — and yet 
They find there lingers fresh and sweet 

Some blooms of mignonette. 



ELIZA 0. PEIRSON. 6 1 

All brilliant flowers are pale and dead 

And sadly droop to earth, 
While pansies chill in velvet robes 

Count life but little worth ; 
But in these dark November days 

That wander wild and wet, 
Our thoughts are winged to summer hours 

On breath of mignonette. 

Along the garden ways of life 

Droop withered hopes to-day ; 
Blooms that we thought were iumwrtelles 

Have faded quite away ; 
But on the graves of friendships dead 

Some frail sweet flowers are set, 
Whose autumn fi-agrance thrills the heart 

Like breath of mignonette. 

Of a cheerful, sunny disposition, Mrs. Peirson is 
yet loyal to the sober side of life, and with faithful affec- 
tion, and remembrance hallowed by tears, she can medi- 
tate tenderly 

OVER THE GRAVES. 

Ermine robes of the winter's weaving 

Jeweled and gilt by the shining sun ; 
Autumn leaves in their glory leaving 

Lonely trees when their work is done ; 
Summer rains in their quiet weeping, 

Bending the daisy's crown of snow, 
Fall on graves in whose silent keeping 

Slumber our loved ones cold and low. 



62 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Tiny fingers of creeping grasses 

Weave a coverlet fresh and fair, 
Gently stirred by the wind that passes 

With low sound as the voice of prayer ; 
Tiny fingers of creeping mosses 

Note the words on the marble cold, 
Cover the dates of our sad losses, 

Touch the names that we loved of old. 

Crickets chirp in the leafy places, 

Honey bees in the blossoms throng, 
Sailing shadow on shadow chases, 

Birds encumber the air with song ; 
Ivies clamber over the crosses, 

Droop and cling to the earthy mold, 
Catching sweets that the lily losses 

Down from her cup of white and gold. 

Silent and sad the mighty shadows 

Settle over each mossy mound ; 
Sailing fogs from the marshy meadows 

Gently, mistily wrap them round ; 
Moonbeams bright with shadowy edges 

Caught from the dark fir trees they pass, 
Shimmer and gleam like silver wedges 

Dropped adown in the dewy grass. 

Starry lights in the heavenly spaces 

Watch above in the solemn night ; 
Guarding mists that the day displaces 

Rise on sunbeam ladders of light ; 
Bending roses of summer pressing 

Sweet red lips to the daisy snow, 
Murmur ever of peace and blessing 

Over our loved ones cold and low ! 



ELIZA 0. PEIRSON. 63 

Mrs. Peirson's thought is quite religiously inclined, 
and nearly all her poems are of a soberly reflective 
character. Now and then she paints a picture, but even 
the picture has in it something of moralizing. Moral- 
izing so pleasantly phrased, however, is very pleasant 
reading, especially when hid in the guise of 

A SWEDISH LEGEND. 

It is told in Swedish story, 

'Mong the legends quaint and old, 
How a priest and monk were passing 

Where the river waters rolled, 
And were hushed to silent wonder 

At the music strange and sweet 
That among the high rocks echoed 

Yet seemed rising round their feet. 

They beheld a merman floating 

On the waters rippling bright, 
And his long hair fell about him 

Like a flood of golden light, 
While his lute's sweet music sounded 

All the rocks and hills among, 
And afar a deep-toned answer 

From the chapel bell was flung. 

*' Hush, for shame ! " the prelate shouted — 

" For such as you it is not meet 
To give forth such luring music 

To delay all passing feet. 
For no more your sinful spirit 

Can be saved from endless strife 
Than this worn, dead staff I'm holding 

Can renew its blooming life." 



64 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Then a wailing sounded wildly 

From the merman left alone, 
And a sadness seemed to echo 

In the chapel bell's deep tone, 
While the monks in fear and trembling, 

Looked upon their angiy chief, 
For behold ! the staff he walked with 

Bursting into bud and leaf ! 

Awe and pain, and deep contrition 

Crept into the prelate's heart, 
As he thought how far and proudly 

He had kept himself apart 
From all lower, weaker classes ; 

Drooping low on bended knee 
Prayed he with an humbled spirit — 

" Teach me love and charity ! " 

Ne'er before that morning service 

Sounded priestly words so sweet, 
Never did the monks so meekly 

Each devout response repeat ; 
While a faint, sweet music echoed 

Up the chapel aisles and stairs, 
Chiming softly with the chanting, 

Mingling sweetly with the prayers ! 

It is the privilege of but few, always to stand upon 
the mountain-tops. Yet they who walk the low-lands, 
far beneath, at evening gray or morning dawn, or through 
long twilight times between, may see with Mrs. Peirson, 
if they will, the glad 



ELIZA O. PEIRSON. 

LIGHT ON THE HILLS 
Light on the distant hills ! 

While we in shadow rest, 
A light that gleams through broken clouds 

That sail from east to west, 
That break and move and drift apart. 

Revealing clearest blue, 
And silver edges bright and clear 

Where gleams the sunshine through. 

Light on the distant hills ! 

Where pure on winter days 
The white snow lies against the skies ; 

Where autumn's robes of haze 
Fall round her golden sandaled feet, 

Where summer grasses creep ; 
O'er which the years with dying tears 

Pass onward to their sleep. 

Light on the distant hills ! 

Beyond whose farthest rim 
Are loving friends whose trust and truth 

Through changes grow not dim ; 
Are homes where welcome warm awaits 

And pleasures wing the hours ; 
And graves where faithful hearts are still 

Beneath the grass and flowers. 

Light on the distant hills ! 

That clearly, calmly rise. 
Though weary grow the youthful feet 

And dim the love-lit eyes ; 
The calm, grand, everlasting hills, 

That ever changeless stand. 



65 



66 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Though nations mourn their ruler's fall 
And war sweep o'er the land. 

Light on the distant hills ! 

The light of truth and right ; 
The years sweep on, the nations move, 

And goodness gathers might. 
The winds of God shall sweep the clouds 

Away across the sky, 
And all the shades shall be dispelled 

That in the valleys lie ; 
And though these shadows linger still, 

The heart with rapture thrills, 
That while we wait and work and pray 

The light shines on the hills ! 

Mrs. Peirson's prose is almost as poetical as her 
verse. It is very pure in expression, very tender in sen- 
timent, often, and evidently the work of an introspec- 
tive mind. If it most generally takes on the character 
of reverie, it is a refining and healthful reverie, sugges- 
tive of self-betterment, and there ought to be more of it. 





M. H. COBB. 

OME men are born reformers. Love of their 
fellowman, and desire for human betterment, 
seem part of their very being. Quick to recog- 
nizs the Universal Want, their faith is strong that this 
Want will speedily be met. They will compel the millen- 
nial day in a lustrum, at the furthest, they fondly believe, 
and in this belief they labor on, fainting not, neither grow- 
ing weary — wondering that the world so slowly pro- 
gresses, perhaps, but confident that it does progress, and 
full of hope in its near future. 

These reformers are patient, even in their impa- 
tience. They make real sacrifices. They work with an 
eye single to improving their race. Personal advance- 
ment, selfish interests, go for naught. Sinking the in- 
dividual in the mass, they aspire only to a general good. 
In a rare spirit of philanthropic self-abnegation they 
seek solely the welfare of mankind. If they remain 
poor in purse it is small wonder. If they do not ulti- 
mately become despondent and cynical, the wonder is 
scarcely less. The millennium does not dawn ; an ideal 
manhood does not gladden the world ; their labors ap- 
pear productive of little fruit. And the hands do at last 
tire of toil ; the gray hairs do come and multiply ; the 



68 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. \ 

wrinkles hint of accumulating years and an end to s 

doing. \ 

Of this class of born reformers is Mr. M. H. Cobb, I 
now Cashier of the United States Mint, in Philadelphia, 

longtime connected with the Newspaper Press, and au- \ 

thor of the following Waif: j 

THE WORLD WOULD BE THE BETTER FOR IT. '. \ 

\ 

If men cared less fo'r wealth and fame, ^ 

And less for battle-fields and glory, | 

If writ in human hearts a name i 

Seemed better than in song or story ; I 

If men instead of nursing pride \ 

Would learn to hate it and abhor it, ' 

If more relied } 

On love to guide, ■ .\ 

The world would be the better for it. ! 

< 

If men dealt less in stocks and lands. 

And more in bonds and deeds fraternal, \ 
If love's work had more willing hands 

To link this world with the supernal ; '\ 

If men stored up Love's oil and wine ' 

And on bruised human hearts would pour it, j 

If " yours " and " mine " 1 

Would once combine, \ 

The world would be the better for it. \ 

If more would act the play of Life, '\ 

And fewer spoil it in rehearsal ; « ^ 

If Bigotry would sheath its knife, ! 
Till good became more universal ; 

If Custom, gray with ages grown, ^ 



M. H. COBB. 69 

Had fewer blind men to adore it, — 

If Talent shone 

In Truth alone, 
The world would be the better for it. 

If men were wise in little things — 

Affecting less in all their dealings ; 
If hearts had fewer rusted strings 

To isolate their kindred feelings ; 
If men, when Wrcng beats down the Right, 
Would strike together to restore it, — 
If Right made Might 
In every fight, 
The world would be the better for it. 

This poem, like many others from the same pen, 
was begotten of a strong desire to make man better, and '■ 
therefore happier. It is a development in rhyme of the 
idea supreme in its author's mind, but oftener finding 
expression in years gone by than now. For the reform 
spirit sometimes appears to be less dominant in a man, 
as circumstances hedge him about, and its manifestations 
become less marked. Mr. Cobb is to-day as much a re- 
former at heart as when, twenty years ago, he penned the 
above waif — his desire for human betterment is not less 
strong than it then was — but a group of sunny-hearted 
girls call him father, their noble mother adds a wealth of 
affection to his life, and it is easy to see how his love of 
man has come to be somewhat specialized. 

Mr. Cobb was born on Beech Hill, in the town of 
Colebrook, Litchfield county, Conn,, April 20th, 1828. 



JO WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

His ancestry were of the good stock that settled Ply- 
mouth and Saybrook — so well-known in New England 
history — and so he has a clear title to his temperament 
and taste, both of which are tinged with the missionary 
element, it seems to us, and both of which impel to 
hard work, while the former can bide a patient waiting. 
We have classed him among the born reformers. The 
reform spirit was born with his new-born manhood, in 
manifestation. At the age of fourteen he began writing, 
his first published efforts being tolerable imitations of 
Byron, and funny parodies of Junius in a political way, 
which appeared in the Hartford Times ; but at twenty- 
one he took to enthusiastic verse -making in behalf of 
reform, and his name became familiar to such reform 
lovers as read the New York Tribune. 

Then he set himself about what he regarded the real 
work of man 's moral redemption ; and he labored with 
rare faithfulness. ''I have worked twenty hours a day," 
he wrote us once, ''and lived on less than a dollar a 
week, expecting to see the world ever so much improved 
thereby. It was an amusing dream. Still, the example 
told, and if human gratitude can comfort one I may be 
comforted." It will be seen that he had faith. It will 
be seen, also, that he measures his efforts more correctly 
than once he did ; it is possible that he even undervalues 
them. Good, faithful, loyal service will better the world 
somewhat — -thus much is sure — though it may not to 
our knowledge speed millennial glory. 



M, H. COBB. 71 

Mr. Cobb took to the politico -journalistic field, and 
nearly all his endeavor has been put forth therein. Per- 
haps it is for this reason that his labors seem to him less 
fruitful than they should have been ; for the field is large, 
and the really reform laborers very few. It is probable 
that politics never paid him for all his doing, inasmuch 
as politics never or seldom pays the honest reformer. 
Yet amid discouragements and defeats, through more 
than two decades of waiting for results, he has never 
actually lost faith, has never given up hope, has never 
grown cynical and old in the conflict. His heart is as 
young as ever, albeit he no longer expects immediate re- 
turns from work. An extract from one of his letters 
will show his present state of mind : ' ' Now I think of 
man as he will be a few ages hence, after I am dust. 
The divine image is in him, and can not be alto- 
gether suppressed. He has sometimes given me a blow 
for my love, and I have paid him for it. Because he 
still loves to wallow I do not despair. Let us give him 
the benefit of a living hope in his capacity for improve- 
ment. " 

Circumstances, the outgrowth of a dominant idea, 
in part, have kept Mr. Cobb from cultivating the poeti- 
cal side of his nature as he would otherwise have culti- 
vated it. Rhythm was born in him earlier than reform, 
but became subservient to it. In his early childhood he 
improvised. As we have said, he began writing for pub- 
lication when very young. But rhythmic expression was 



72 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

largely foregone after the reform idea took such hold 
upon him. He wrote a dozen times as many poems at 
fifteen years of age as at twenty-five ; and since then the 
poetic impulse has been yielded to very rarely. When he 
has written verse he has been strongly moved to it ; and 
in the majority of such instances the effort has never seen 
the light of print. Among our papers we find the fol 
lowing : 

THE SHIPS THA T SAIL AWAY. 

I think of the ships that sail away, 
The white- winged ships that sail away, 
Freighted with fears and wrested tears, 
And joys we gathered for long, long years, 
For the possible rainy day. 

I sleep, and dream of the white-winged ships 
That glide from the shores of life away ! 
That swiftly glide with the ebbing tide. 
Bearing my joys to the farther side, 
Into the twilight gray. 

O, ships that vanish into the past ! 
Are none to return to the port at last ? 
Shall I vainly wait at the seward gate 
Beaten, and bruised, and scarred by fate, 
Chilled by the winter blast? 

The ships that carry my griefs — alas ! 
Have hulls of iron and shrouds of brass ! 
The storm's impact leaves them intact. 
Though hurled on the jagged rocks of Fact, 
Where fearful breakers mass ! 



M. H. COBB. 



73 



Writing, with Mr. Cobb, is often less a matter of 
volition than compulsion. The poetic impulse is strong 
within him under the influence of either pain or pleas- 
ure. From his temperament he will take to rhythmic 
expression ^yhenever hurt or pleased, or whenever by any 
means fervently wrought upon. ' ' The World would be 
the Better for It " took form in his mind almost unbidden 
early one December morning in 1854, and rising he 
transcribed it, sent it to The Tribune, and it has been 
every^vhere read, since. He obeyed the poetic impulse 
then, under the influence of love for the community. 
In the few verses last quoted his impulse was evidently 
influenced by some sharp thrust of disappointment, that 
left keen pain in the soul. The influence is less per- 
sonal, but not quite hidden, in this poem published in 
The Tribune Yn 1866, entitled 

DECEMBER. 

Far down the somber-tinted North, 
Where Argol leads his train of suns, 

Gray Winter's herald issues forth 
And casts his mantle as he runs. 

So speeds he in his icy mail ; 

His breath falls down in glitt'ring frost, 
And like the sea-spray on the gale 

Kis hoary, unbound locks are tost. 

He smites the rivers and the lakes ; 

His path is over plain and hill ; 
The night is past, and morning breaks 

Upon the mountains, gray and chill. 



74 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHQRS. 

O Summer, with your violet eyes ! 

O golden Autumn, many-sheaved ! 
Our griefs are voiced in sobs and sighs. 

Like little children oft-bereaved. 

O winds, perfumed with Summer flowers ! 

O fields, in Summer's emerald sheen ! 
O Summer birds, and Summer bowers, 

O Summer days and nights serene ! 

We have but a few of Mr. Cobb's published poems 
before us from which to select, and therefore can only 
give such as illustrate his various styles of thought, with- 
out feeling any wise sure that either specimen given is 
the best of its kind which he has produced. The fol- 
lowing was contributed to The Tribune just after the loss 
of an ocean steamer : 

A SHIP SAILED OUT TO SEA. 

Over the pathless deep 

A thousand miles away, 
Where spicy breezes sleep 

To wake at shut of day, 
A gallant ship went down — 
A thousand fathoms down, 

Beneath the waters blue — 

Ship, passengers, and crew. 

No eye beheld the wreck 

Save the All-seeing Eye ; 
But, from the crowded deck 

Went up a fearful cry. 
Ere to their nameless graves 



M. H. COBB. 75 

Beneath the pitiless waves, 
Five hundred and a score 
That foundering vessel bore. 

"No tidings ! " rang the press ; 
" No tidings of the ship !" 
A city paused in mute distress, 

And whitened every lip ; 
No tidings ? Can it be, 
A ship went down to sea 
And shall return no more 
To homeward port, or shore? 

*' No tidings ! " day by day 

The clanking press rung cut : 
Thus swept the months away ; 
A year of awful doubt. 
' No tdings !" nevermore 
To port on homeward shore, 
"Will that good ship return, 
To comfort those who mourn j 

And thus for many a bark, 

With its immortal freight, 
In chill suspense and dark 

Shall men in anguish wait, 
The while they sadly say — 
" Alas ! they sailed away 

Over the pathless main 

And come not back again ! '* 

Lost— lost at sea ! and yet, 

I see their phantom shapes 
With gleaming sails all set, 

Doubling the shadowy capes ; 



^6 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

The capes that fade away, 
Like shades at shut of day, 

Into the waste of Night ! 

Into the utter Night ! 

This, of quite another character, appeared in The 
Evening Post several years ago. It conjures up a picture 
of rare beauty, and is delicately limned : 

THE MOUNTAIN IN THE WEST. 

Last eve the sunset winds upheaved 

A mountain in the west. 
All seamed with gloomy gulfs, from base 

Up to its golden crest ; 
Cloud piled on cloud that mountain rose — 

A storm whose wrath was spent ♦»- 
Its routed legions gathered up, 

In common ruin blent ; 
And all about its dark base rolled 

A sea of gorgeous dyes, 
And on its summit blazed a fire 

Too bright for mortal eyes ; 
And grandly down its southern slope 

A purpling river flowed 
Into the sea of gorgeous dyes 

Which at its foot abode. 

And we, who marked the scene sublime, 

Beheld a shining band 
Press upward to the mountain top, 

As to a Promised Land ; 
Their faces kindling with the light 

That played about its crest—- 



M. H. COBB. 77 

And two, more glorious, led the way. 

In spotless garments dressed ; 
Some wearied on the way, and these 

The stronger lifted up. 
And held unto their parching lips 

Love's overflowing cup — 
And thus refreshed, they buoyantly 

Pressed forward in the van. 
And leaped and danced for gladness, where 

The purpling river ran. 

Thus joyously the band pressed on 

Until the least had won 
And stood transfigured on the mount — 

The children of the sun ; 
But soon their brightness w^axed too great 

For mortal eyes to bear. 
And Night, in mercy, dropped her veil 

To hide the vision fair ; 
But we, who saw that light sublime. 

Hallowing yestereven. 
Joyed in the thought that we had sped 

A little nearer Heaven. 

Mr. Cobb was of the original staff of the New 
York World, and later was employed upon the Phila- 
delphia Daily Day. He is now taking life a little easier 
than active journalism permits — enjoying a half respite, 
richly earned by long years of hard and unceasing toil. 




James G. Clark. 




JAMES G. CLARK. 

HERE are some waifs which we are ahvays glad 

to see, however often we chance upon them, — 

some which, through their sweet suggestiveness, 
never fail to awaken purer reflections, to turn our thought 
for a little time away from every-day themes, and to lead 
us up, out of self and selfish things, into a new atmos- 
phere. Of this class is the following, ever worthy the 
space so frequently accorded it by newspapers : 

ART THO U LIVING YE T. 

Is there no grand, immortal sphere 

Beyond the realm of broken ties, 
To fill the wants that mock us here, 

And dry the tears from weeping eyes ; 
Where winter melts in endless spring, 

And June stands near with deathless flowers ; 
Where we may hear the dear ones sing 

Who loved us in this world of ours? 
I ask, and lo ! my cheeks are wet 

With tears for one I can not see ; 
Oh, mother, art thou living yet, 

And dost thou still remember me? 

I feel thy kisses o'er me thrill, 

Thou unseen angel of my life ; 
I hear thy hymns around me thrill j 

An undertone to care and strife ; \ 



So WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

Thy tender eyes upon me shine, 

As from a being glorified, 
Till I am thine and thou art mine, 

And I forget that thou hast died. 
I almost lose each vain regret 

In visions of a life to be ; 
But, mother, art thou living yet, 

And dost thou still remember me ? 

The springtimes bloom, the summers fade. 

The winters blow along my way ; 
s But over every light and shade 

Thy memory lives by night and day ; 
It soothes to sleep my wildest pain, 

Like some sweet song that can not die, 
And, like the murmur of the main, 

Grows deeper when the storm is nigh. 
I know the brightest stars that set 

Return to bless the yearning sea ; 
But, mother, art thou living yet, 

And dost thou still remember me ? 

I sometimes think thy soul comes .back 

From o'er the dark and silent stream, 
Where last we watched thy shining track 

To those green hills of which we dream ; 
Thy loving arms around me twine. 

My cheeks bloom younger in thy breath, 
Till thou art mine and I am thine. 

Without a thought of pain or death ; 
And yet, at times, my eyes are wet 

With tears for her I can not see — 
Oh ! mother, art thou living yet, 

And dost thou still remember me 



JAMES G. CLARK. Ci 

Was there ever more tender tribute paid to a moth- 
er's memory, than throbs throughout this? The ques- 
tioning exists only in form ; this we reaUze, as we read 
each soulful line. In the poet's remembrance the 
mother lives on, as much a cheering personal presence 
as in the days gone by ; and the poet feels that when 
life's waiting is over, together they will enter upon im- 
mortality. Thank God that some mothers live thus, al- 
though their places here with us be vacant ! 

The poem has been so widely published with full 
recognition of authorship that, although often appearing 
as a waif, we need hardly say it was written by James G. 
Clark. Mr. Clark was born on the 28th of June, 1830, 
in the little village of Constantia, N. Y., close by the 
border of Oneida Lake. His parents were excellent 
Christian people, well-known and much respected in the 
community. His father, Sereno Clark, was quite promi- 
nent in Oswego county politics, being Supervisor of his 
town for ten or twelve years, Justice of the Peace full 
twenty years, and member of the Constitutional Con- 
vention in 1846. His mother was a very fine singer, and 
possessed of a highly poetic organization, and from her 
he inherited those gifts that have made him so popular 
as a balladist and poet. We believe both parents have 
been dead several years. 

In childhood Mr. Clark displayed great taste for 
music, as also a strong liking for dreamful idleness. 
Before he could talk he sang tunes correctly ; and much 

7 



82 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

of his time, in summer, he spent in lonely loitering 
about the borders of Oneida Lake, dreaming the days 
away. His educational opportunities were fair, nothing 
more. Largely self-taught, in music as in general 
knowledge, he owes much to a rare quickness of per- 
ception allied to unusual powers of memory, and to a 
ready comprehension of the salient features of things. 
He has been all his life a student, though not many 
years a student of the schools. He has studied human- 
ity and nature, with a largeness of heart and a sympathy 
of soul to understand both. 

Mr. Clark first drew public attention to himself, not 
as a poet, but as a concert singer. Or rather, while he 
began by being both poet and singer — for from the out- 
set he sang his own songs — people thought of him first 
as singer instead of poet. He drifted into the concert 
field by force of natural tendencies, with no thought 
that he might make concertizing a permanent business. 
First he traveled with a troupe of his own, made up from 
neighboring counties ; then he associated himself with 
Ossian E. Dodge — famous as a public performer twenty 
years ago — acting for a time in the capacity of musical 
composer, and afterwards as musical director, of the 
troupe known as "Ossian's Bards. " We have said that 
at first the people thought of him rather as the singer 
than the poet, and yet it was during this portion of his 
life that he wrote and set to music several of his best 
known and most admired poems — poems which have 



JAMES G. CLARK. %t^ 

done ballad duty every since, and which, it is safe to say, 
have been more popular among the cultured and intelli- 
gent than any similar productions from any other Ameri- 
can writer. ''The Rover's Grave;" "The Old Moun- 
tain Tree; ''The Rock of Liberty;" "Meet Me by the 
Running Brook;" "The Mountains of Life," and "The 
Beautiful Hills," carried his name everywhere. 

"The Mountains of Life" has been very widely 
copied and several times plagiarized. 

THE MOUNT A INS OF LIFE. 

There's a land far away 'mid the stars we are told, 
Where they know not the sorrows of time. 

Where the pure waters wander through valleys of gold, 
And life is a treasure sublime ; 

'T -s the land of our God, 't is the home of the soul. 

Where ages of splendor eternally roll — 

Where the way-weary traveler reaches his goal, 
On the evergreen Mountains of Life. 

Our gaze cannot soar to that beautiful land, 

But our visions have told of its bliss, 
An^ our souls by the gales from its garden are fanned, 

When we faint in the desert of this ; 
And we sometimes have longed for its holy repose. 
When our spirits were torn with temptations and woes, 
And we' ve drank from the tide of the river that flows 
From the evergreen Mountains of Life. 

O, the stars never tread the blue heavens at night 

But we think where the ransomed have trod — 

And the day never smiles from his palace of light 
But wc feel the bright smile of our God ; 



84 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

We are traveling homewai'd, through changes and gloom, 
To a kingdom where pleasures unceasingly bloom, 
" And our guide is the glory that shines through the tomb," 
From the evergreen Mountains of Life. 

Finer than this, in the estimation of many, and 
differing from it sufficiently to be included here, al- 
though nearly akin in spirit, is the following : 

THE BE A UTIFUL HILLS. 

Oh ! the Beautiful Hills where the blest have trod 

Since the years when the earth was new ; 
Where our fathers gaze from the field of God, 

On the vale we are traveling through. 
We have seen those hills in their brightness rise, 

When the world was black below. 
And we' ve felt the thrill of immortal eyes, 
In the night of our darkest woe. 

Then sing for the Beautiful Hills, 

That rise from the evergreen shore ; 
Oh ! sing for the Beautiful Hills, 

Where the weary shall toil no more. 

The cities of yore that were reared in crime, 

And renowned by the praise of seers, 
Went down in the tramp of old King Time, 

To sleep with his gray-haired years. 
But the Beautiful Hills rise bright and strong 

Through the smoke of old Time's red wars. 
As on that day when the first deep song 

Rose up from the morning stars. 

Then sing for the Beautiful Hills, etc. 



JAMES G. CLARK. g^ 

We dream of rest on the Beautiful Hills, 

Where the traveler shall thirst no more ; 
And we hear the hum of a thousand rills 

That wander the green glens o'er. 
We can feel the souls of the martyred men 

Who have braved a cold world's frown ; 
We can bear the burdens which they did then, 

Nor shrink from their thorny crown. 

Then sing for the Beautiful Hills, etc. 

Our arms are weak, yet we would not fling 

To our feet this load of ours. 
The winds of spring to the valleys sing, 

And the turf replies with flowers ; 
And thus we learn on our wintry way, 

How a mightier arm controls. 
That the breath of God on our lives will play 
Till our bodies bloom to souls. 

Then sing for the Beautiful Hills, 

That rise from the evergreen shore ; 
Oh ! sing for the Beautiful Hills, 

Where the weary shall toil no more. 

Another, not less known, and always liked, as well 
for the uncommon beauty of the poem as for the sweet- 
ness of the melody to which it was wedded, we give 
entire : 

MARION MOORE. 

Gone, art thou, Marion, Marion Moore, 
Gone, like the bird in the autumn that singeth ; 
Gone, like the flower by the way-side that springeth. 
Gone like the leaf of the ivy that clingeth • 

Round the lone rock on a storm-beaten shore. 



S6 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Dear w^ert thou Marion, Marion Mooi-e, 
Dear as the tide in my broken heart throbbing ; 
Dear as the soul o'er thy memory sobbing ; 
Sorrow my life of its roses is robbing ; 

Wasting is all the glad beauty of yore. 

I will remember thee, Marion Moore ; 
I will remember, alas ! to regret thee ; 
I will regret when all others forget thee ; 
Deep in my breast will the hour that I met thee 

Linger and burn till life's fever is o'er. 

Gone, art thou, Marion, Marion Mooi^e ' 
Gone, like the breeze o'er the billow that bloweth ; 
Gone, like the rill to the ocean that floweth ; 
Gone, as the day from the gray mountain goeth, 

Darkness behind thee, but glory before ' 

Peace to thee, Marion, Marion Moore ! 
Peace which the queens of the earth can not borrow ; 
Peace from a kingdom that crowned thee with sorrow ; 
O ! to be happy with thee on the morrow. 

Who would not fly from this desolate shore ? 

In all the ballad literature of our language there is 
no purer sentiment than is embodied in these five stan- 
zas, nowhere is pure sentiment more admirably ex- 
pressed. We never sing the fourth stanza but the beauty 
of that last simile impresses us anew. 

" Gone, as the day fro7ti the gray mountain goeth. 
Darkness behind thee, but glory before ! " 

Could there be anything more completely expressive.? 
One can rarely find as perfect a gem as this. And very 



JAMES G. CLARK. 87 

seldom will you chance upon a tenderer little ballad \ 

than this of ■ 

SWEET RUTH. 1 

The summer will soon be here, sweet Ruth, ^! 

For the birds of brighter bowers { 

Are singing their way from the balmy South ! 

To the land of opening flowers ; '■ 

But the summer will fade, and the flowers will die, '* 

And the birds, from bank and plain, '}■ 

Go mourning back to a warmer sky ~ '\ 

While I wait for thee in vain. ■ 

O ! many a heart and many a hand \ 

I have prized in pain and bliss, - 

Have found that rest in a better land \ 

Which they never knew in this ; '"% 

And of all the forms that fled with thee, '? 

From a kingdom fraught with tears, '\ 

There are none that seem like thine to me \ 

Through the golden mist of years. J 

But I never hive wished thee back, sweet Ruth, 1 

In the years that since have rolled, ; 

And I guard the mem.ory of thy truth \ 

As a miser would his gold. \ 

The loneliest glens of my" being know \ 

How the birds of peace may sing, % 

And the darkest waves have caught the glow \ 

From a guardian angel's wing. "■ 

-i 

While Mr. Clark was director of "Ossian's Bards/* .; 

the bass singer of the troupe — Mr. Albert G. Tanner, \ 

of Jordan, — a very excellent and gifted young man, , 



88 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

sickened with fever, and died. It was in his memory 
that "November" was written, one of Mr. Clark's best 
pieces. We would much like to copy it in full, but will 
give only the closing stanzas : 

I hear the muffled tramp of years 

Come stealing up the slope of Time ; 
They bear a train of smiles and tears, 

Of burning hopes and dreams sublime ; 
But future years may never fling 

A treasure from their passing hours, 
Like those that come on sleepless wing, 

From memory's golden plain of flowers. 

The morning breeze of long-ago 

Sweeps o'er my brain with soft control, 
Fanning the embers to a glow, 

Amidst the ashes round my soul ; 
And by the dim and flickering light, 

I see thy beauteous form appear. 
Like one returned from wandering bright, 

To bless my lonely moments here. 

Tanner's death necessitated a re -organization of 
the troupe, and while looking for a man to fill the va- 
cancy, Mr. Clark took the field alone, and began giving 
ballad concerts. Since that time he has constantly sung 
alone, as a matter both of profit and choice. He has 
been highly successful. That he has been able to sus- 
tain himself so many years, unassisted by other talent, 
is ample testimony as to the character of his entertain- 
ments. Possessing a voice of peculiar sweetness, and 



JAMES G. CLARK. 89 

having that £nal accomplishment of the good balladist, a 
perfect enunciation, to Hsten to him of an evening is 
genuine pleasure unalloyed. 

One secret of his success in the concert-room lies in 
the fact that his songs are not common-place rhyme, or 
wretched doggerel. In selecting a song for public ren- 
dering, his first consideration is sentiment that he be- 
lieves in; the next, poetic expression that he can ap- 
prove of. Other considerations are secondary to these. 
As a result, his singing has an influence uplifting and 
ennobling ; and we can heartily endorse the expression 
of the Rev. Dr. Cuyler, in wishing there were *'ten 
thousand such men singing truths into the hearts of the 
people." 

Of late years Mr. Clark has written little verse — not 
the half that should have come from his pen. Early in 
the war he gave us the best lyric called forth by that sad 
time, unless we except Mrs. Howe's "Battle Hymn," 
and it seemed a pity that he should not write more 
lyrics. True, he did pen one or two others, when war 
had ceased, and they went the rounds of the press. One 
of these, and the longest, is entitled "The Boatman's 
Dream," and blends the descriptive and the imaginative 
in an unusual degree. To illustrate how largely his tal- 
ent partakes of the former element, we quote the first 
two stanzas, which are rarely equalled : 

With long arms o'er the prairies tossed, 
And feet that bathed in tropic spray, 



go . WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

And head all white with Northern frost, 

The mighty Sire of Waters lay ; 
His fingers gleamed with priceless mines, 

Or watered herds along the plains, 
And lowly grass and lofty pines 

Drew life and grandeur from his veins. 

The June winds left their mountain towers. 

Which guard the Valleys of the West, 
With odors from a million flowers, 

To soothe the sleeping giant's rest ; 
They danced along his pulsing form, 

With many a quaint and charming grace, 
And threw their kisses, sweet and warm. 

In dimples on his weary face. 

The poem which, of all he has written, Mr. Clark 
considers best, we reproduce, entire, below. In its way, 
it has few, if any, equals, and is certainly unsurpassed. 
It was written during ten days of watching by the bed- 
side of that mother to whom he has paid such loving 
tribute in the Waif of this article — watching that ended 
only with the mother's death — written, as Mr. Clark once 
assured us, when the pressure to write was irresistible, 
when he could not help writing. 

LEON A. 

Leona, the hour draws nigh, 

The hour we' ve awaited so long, 
For the angel to open a door through the sky, 
That my spirit may break from its prison and try 

Its voice in an infinite song. 



JAMES G. CLARK. ^j 

Just now, as the slumbers of night 

Came o'er me with peace-giving breath, 
The curtain, half lifted, revealed to my sight 
Those windows which look on the kingdom of light, 
That borders the river of death. 

And a vision fell solemn and sweet. 

Bringing gleams of a morning-lit land ; 
I saw the white shore which the pale waters beat, 
And I heard the low lull as they broke at their feet 
Who walked on the beautiful strand. 

And I wondered why spirits should cling 
To their clay with a struggle and sigh, 
When life's purple autumn is better than spring, 
Apd the soul flies away like a sparrow, to sing 
In a climate where leaves never die. 

Leona, come close to my bed. 

And lay your dear hand on my brow ; 
The same touch that thrilled me in days that are fled, 
And raised the lost roses of youth from the dead, 
Can brighten the brief moments now. 

We have loved from the cold world apart. 
And your trust was too generous and true 

For their hate to o'erthrow ; when the slanderer's dart 

Was rankling deep in my desolate heart, 
I was dearer than ever to you. 

I thank the Great Father for this. 

That our love is not lavished in vain ; 
Each germ, in the future, will blossom to bliss, 
And the forms that we love, and the lips that we kiss. 
Never shrink at the shadow of pain. 



92 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

By the light of this faith am I taught 

That my labor is only begun ; 
In the strength of this hope have I struggled and fought 
With the legions of wrong, till my armor has caught 

The gleam of Eternity's sun. 

Leona, look forth and behold, 

From headland, from hillside, and deep, 

The day-king surrenders his banners of gold ; 

The twilight advances through woodland and wold, 
And the dews are beginning to weep. 

The moon's silver hair lies uncurled, 

Down the broad-breasted mountains away ; 
Ere sunset's red glories again shall be furled 
On the walls of the west, o'er the plains of the world, • 
I shall rise in a limitless day. 

O ! come not in tears to my tomb, 

Nor plant with frail flowei's the sod ; 

There is rest among roses too sweet for its gloom, 

And life where the lilies eternally bloom 

In the balm-breathing gardens of God. 

Yet deeply those memories burn. 

Which bind me to you and to earth. 
And I sometimes have thought that my being would yearn 
In the bowers of its beautiful home, to return 
And visit the land of its birth. 

'T would even be pleasant to stay. 
And walk by your side to the last ; 

But the land-breeze of Heaven is beginning to play — 

Life's shadows are meeting Eternity's day, 

And its tumult is hushed in the past. 



JAMES G. CLARK. 9, 

Leona, good-by ; should the grief 

That is gathering now ever be 
Too dark for your faith, you will long for relief, 
And remember, the journey, though lonesome, is brief, 

Over lowland and river to me. 

It will be seen on perusing such poems as '' Leona," 
" The Evergreen Mountains of Life" and "The Beauti- 
ful Hills," — indeed it is apparent in nearly all his poeti- 
cal productions — that INIr. Clark's nature is peculiarly a 
religious one. Yet his religion is of a broad and liberal 
type ; in fact, he is in religion what he is in politics — a 
radical. By church connection an Episcopalian, by na- 
tive sympathy of thought and feeling he is a Liberal, 
with theology as wide as the widest. He seems to have 
been foreordained a Reformer. He sings and writes 
always in the interest of what he deems Truth. Within 
a few years he has WTitten several prose essays, for The 
Independent and other papers, which in their radicalness 
have been vigorous and pungent, and which have shown 
him to be one of the strong thinkers of the time. As 
another specimen of his purely religious verse, we quote 
the following : 

THE DA WN OF REDEMPTION. 

See them go forth like the floods to the ocean, 

Gathering might from each mountain and glen ; 

Wider and deeper the tide of devotion 

Rolls up to God from the bosoms of men ; 

Hear the great multitude, mingling in chorus. 



i)4 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. • 1 

Groan as they gaze from their crimes to the sky, ''.< 

Father, the midnight of death gathers o'er us, ^\ 

When will the dawn of redemption draw nigh ? " ' 

Look on us wanderers, sinful and lowly, ; 

Struggling with grief and temptation below ; I 

Thine is the goodness o'er everything holy, \ 

Thine is the mercy to pity our woe ; \ 

Thine is the power to cleanse and restore us ■* 

Spotless and pure as the angels on high, 

*' Father, the midnight of death gathers o'er us, i 

When will the dawn of redemption draw nigh?" '\ 

Gray hair and golden youth, matron and maiden, ,; 

Lovers of mammon and followers of fame, '♦; 

All with the same solemn burden are laden, \ 

Lifting their souls to that one mighty name: J 

*' Wild is the pathway that surges before us, ' 

On the broad waters the black shadows lie, ' \ 

Father, the midnight of death gathers o'er us, ] 

When will the dawn of redemption draw nigh?" | 

Lo! the vast depths of futurity's ocean ,, 

Heave with the pulse of the Infinite breath, ■ 

Why should we shrink from the billows' commotion? | 

Angels are walking the waters of death ; '^ 

Angels are blending their notes in the chorus, i 

Rising like incense from earth to the sky, i 

" Father, the billows grow lighter before us, ' : 

Heaven with its mansions eternal draws nigh." "■ 

Mr. Clark is a fine specimen of physical manhood. 

Always temperate — in principle and practice a Total \ 

Abstainer — he has preserved his powers singularly well ; '\ 

and having studied the art of keeping in good health he \ 



JAMES G. CLARK. ^^ 

is full of promise for the years to come. Above the me- 
dium height, he carries a good head on goodly shoul- 
ders, erect and manlike. He wears a full beard, of a 
deep auburn tint, deeming the razor a civilization against 
nature ; and above this his aquiline nose, his rather small 
but soul-lit eyes, and his broad, high forehead, over 
which the wavy hair drops in half carelessness, form a 
pleasing picture. He has been several years married, 
and has two interesting children, and resides in Syracuse 
in the interim of his concert tours. 

Dr. James C. Jackson, editor of The Laws of Life 
and a keen judge of men, in a letter to the Rochester 
Democrat &' Chronicle pronounced Mr. Clark's making 
up "eminently composite," and after speaking of his 
musical and poetical gifts said : 

*'As a comedian, exhibiting only in the privacies ofj 
the parlor, he shows wonderful endowments. Were he 
to cultivate his capacities the highest citizens of the land 
would gather to his entertainments, would he but make 
them public. He makes a great mistake to let this field 
lie fallow. As a conversationist he is very entertaining, 
and as a prose writer he is making character rapidly. If 
James G. Clark will keep teachable — willing to learn by 
whomsoever Divine Providence will send to him, and at 
the same time study the art of persuasiveness, I believe 
that he will yet give to mankind a poem that will carry 
his name lovingly to future generations. " 



gS WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

We agree with Dr. Jackson as to the possibilities 
within him whom we have imperfectly sketched. James 
G. Clark should be more than a "newspaper poet." 
What he has already written is as worthy the blue and 
gold of our libraries as is most of that which wears the 
literary ermine — more worthy than much. And what he 
has written is only a prelude to what he ought to write. 
But he is not a prolific writer; he never will be. He is 
too much an artist ever to be voluminous. He finishes, 
as he goes along, and is as rigid in his choice of words 
as was ever the man whom he most resembles in general 
— Tom Moore. He composes mainly while walking, 
somewhat as did Wordsworth, and not seldom will repeat 
an entire poem before a line of it has been penned 
down. If ever he does pen a long poem — and we trust 
he may — it will be conscientiously worked out, will be a 
labor of artistic love, and will place his name high 
among the gifted singers of the world. As showing the 
artistic finish of Mr. Clark's verse, and to catch, in 
parting from him, a little more of his delicate regard for 
natural beauty, albeit somewhat tinged in this instance 
by a shade of melancholy, we quote 

THE WOOD-ROBIN. 

How calmly the lingering light 

Beams back over woodland and main, 

As an infant, ere closing its eyelids at night, 
Looks back on its mother again. 



JAMES G. CLARK. 97 

The wood-robin sings at my door, 

And her song is the sweetest I hear 
From all the sweet birds that incessantly pour 

Their notes through the noon of the year. 

'T was thus in my boyhood time — 

That season of emerald and gold — 
Ere the storms and the shadows that fall on our prime 

Had told me that pleasures grow old. 

I loved in the warm summer eves 

To recline on the welcoming sod, 
By the broad spreading temple of twilight and leaves 

Where the wood-robin worshiped her God, 

I knew not that life could endure 

The burden it beareth to-day ; 
And I felt that my soul was as happy and pure 

As the tone of the wood-robin's lay. 

O, beautiful, beautiful youth. 

With its visions of hope and of love ; 

How cruel is life to reveal us the truth 
That peace only liveth above. 

The wood-robin trills the same tune 

From her thicket in garden and glen, 
And the landscape and sky and the twilight of June 

Look lovely and glowing as then. 

But I think of the glories that fell 

In the harvest of sorrow and tears, 
Till the song of the forest bird sounds like a knell, 

Tolling back through the valley of years. 

Sweet bird, as thou singest forlorn. 

Through the visions that rise from the past, 



pS WAIFS AND THEIR A UTIIORS. 

The deep of the future is purpling with morn, 
And its mystery melting at last. 

I know that the splendor of youth 
Will return to me yet, and my soul 

Will float in the sunlight of beauty and truth, 
Where the tides of the Infinite roll. 

O, I fain would arise and set sail 

From the lowlands of trouble and pain ; 

But I wait on the shore for the tarrying gale, 
And sigh for the haven in vain. 

And I watch for the ripples to play, 

And tell me the breezes are nigh, 
Like a sailor who longs to be wafted away, 

To the lands that lie hid in the sky. 

But the whip-poor-will wails on the moor. 

And day has deserted the west ; 
The moon glimmers down thro' the vines at my door 

And the robin has flown to her nest. 

Adieu, gentle bird ; ere the sun 

Shall line the green forests with light, 

Thou 'It wake from thy slumber more merry than one 
Who heard thee and blessed thee to-night. 





MARY F. TUCKER. 

BOUT the year 1854 two poems appeared in 
The Naiio?ial Era — a paper that had the honor 
of introducing Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe and 
Gail Hamilton to the reading public — which soon be- 
came popular, and which have since periodically gone 
the rounds of the press. The one more often printed, 
perhaps, was the following : 

COMETH A BLESSING DOWN. 

Not to the man of dollars, 

Not to the man of deeds ; 
Not unto craft and cunning, 

Not unto human creeds ; 
Not to the one whose passion. 

Is for a world's renown, 
Not in a form of fashion, 

Cometh a blessing down. 

Not unto land's expansion. 

Not to the miser's chest, 
Now to the princely mansion, 

Not to the blossomed crest : 
Not to the sordid worldling, 

Not to the knavish clown, 
Not to the haughty tyrant, 

Cometh a blessing down. 



lOo WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. \ 

Not to the folly-blinded, 

Not to the steeped in shame, ; 

Not to the carnal-minded, ■: 

Not to unholy fame ; j 

Not in neglect of duty, ' - .^ 

Not to the jeweled crown, '\ 
Not at the smile of beauty, 

Cometh a blessing down. % 

But to the one whose spirit \ 

Yearns for the great and good ; \ 

Unto the one whose store -house , 

Yieldeth the hungry food ; ■ 

Unto the one who labors, I 

Fearless of foe or frown, \ 

Unto the kindly-hearted, \ 

Cometh a blessing down. \ 

Its homely truth has found wide recognition, and .j 

may have moved many hearts to nobler longings, to \ 

freer charity, to more kindly impulse. The other is ^ 

similar in style, and fully as practical in application. \ 

Those who have not read it elsewhere, — even those who \ 

have — will thank us for reproducing it here : ' 

GOING UP AND COMING DOWN. \ 

This is a simple song, 't is true — ; 

My songs are never over-nice, — 
And yet I '11 try and scatter through 

A little pinch of good advice. 
Then listen, pompous friend, and learn 

To never boast of much renown; 
For fortune's wheel is on the turn, 

And some go up, and some come down. 



MARY F. TUCKER. yo\ 

I know a vast amount of stocks, 

A vast amount of pride insures ; 
But Fate has picked so many locks 

I would n't like to warrant yours. 
Remember, then, and never spurn 

The one whose hand is hard and brown, 
For he is likely to go up, 

And you are likely to come down. 

Another thing you will agree, 

(The truth may be as well confessed) 
That " Codfish Aristocracy " 

Is but a scaly thing at best. 
And Madame in her robe of lace. 

And Bridget in her faded gown, 
Both represent a goodly race. 

From father Adam handed down. 

Life is uncertain — full of change ; 

. Little we have that will endure ; 
And t' were a doctrine new and strange 

That places high are most secure ; 
And if the fickle goddess smile. 

Yielding the scepter and the crown, 
*T is only for a little while, 

Then B. goes up and A. comes down. 

This world, for all of us, my friend 

Hath something more than pounds and pence ; 
Then let me humbly recommend, 

A little use of common sense. 
Thus lay all pride of place aside. 

And have a care on whom you frown ; 
For fear you '11 see him going up, 

When you are only coming down. 



I02 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

The author of these two poems was Mary Frances 
Tyler, a young girl of seventeen, small in figure, with 
curling hair and bright gray eyes, living in Michigan. 
She had early manifested a poetic taste, and, though so 
young, had written considerably for local papers. Her 
first published poem was penned when she was but ten 
years old ; and several poems written between her thir- 
teenth and fifteenth years attracted considerable atten- 
tion, and drew forth complimentary letters from distin- 
guished people. 

In 1856 Miss Tyler was married to Dr. E. L. 
Tucker, who practiced his profession in Macon, Mich., 
until the war broke out, and then went to the front as 
Lieutenant in the Fourth Michigan Cavalry. He died 
at Chattanooga, October 5th, 1863, after gallant service 
— one of those fallen heroes whom the country lovingly 
remembers, — and left his young wife a widow, with three 
small children to care for. Something of the bereaved 
one's loneliness speaks through this tender tribute, which 
was written for The Saturday Eveiimg Post : 

INDIAN SUMMER. 
Just such a day in autumn, 

Hazy and soft and sweet, 
With the Indian Summer walking 

Abroad with her sandaled feet. 
Her dusky locks disheveled, 

Her dun robes trailing about 
Just such a dreamy, golden day, 

The lisht of a life went out 



MARY F. TUCKER. 103 

Afar on a southern hillside, 

Where the sycamore branches wave, 
Where the sweet magnolias blossom, 

They hollowed and shaped a grave. 
Oh, beautiful, perished darling ! 

Oh, tenderest heart and true ! 
If only its narrow chamber 

Had folded and sheltered two I 

Year after year the grasses 

Curtain that lowly bed ; 
Summers garland their roses 

Over the precious head : 
Softly the sentinel cypress 

Weaves with the mournful yew ; 
Would that their whispering branches 

Shielded and shadowed two ! 

Again the Indian Summer 

Goeth abroad as of old, 
Bearing her gorgeous banners. 

Crimson, and flame, and gold. 
But alas for her royal beauty ! 

She is girded around about 
With the weeds of an awful sorrow, 

For the light of a life gone out. 

Several years ago Mrs. Tucker removed to Omro, 
Wisconsin, her present residence. Always writing more 
or less for publication, her life is still a retired one, and 
she rather shrinks from than desires recognition. None 
of her later efforts have met with such popularity as has 
been accorded the two poems specially referred to, yet 



I04 



WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 



she has written many things far superior to those in real 
poetic merit. Her recent poems show increasing deli- 
cacy of thought and expression, and give evidence that 
these years of womanly devotion to the child-life in her 
charge are bearing worthy fruit. Very daintily done is 
this, which first appeared in The Phrenological Journal : 

A PICTURE. 

I want to make a picture with my pen, 

And though the unskilled limnei-'s hand may blot, 
It can not be disguised, for there is not 

Another like it in the world of men. 

A face of faultless beauty. Every line 

Princely and peerless ; royal-browed and fair, 
Framed in the splendor of such sun-touched hair 

As artists copy, making art divine. 

Clear well-like eyes, whose yearning tenderness 
Proclaims the poet-passion, strong but fine, 
And more bewildering than ancient wine — 

Compared with them the very stars look less. 

Nor dazzling ruby, pearl, nor amethyst. 

Combine the beauty of the perfect mouth ; 
Dewy and fragrant as the tropic -south. 

Oh, sweetest lips that ever woman kissed ! 

■' . 

And far surpassing symmetry of lines. 

The rare expression, the peculiar grace. 

Lighting it all, as an illumined vase, 

Reflects the hidden glory it enshrines. 

So I have made my picture. And what then 
If it hath fallen far and far below 



MARY F. TUCKER, 

The grand original ? Yet this I know, 
But one is like it in the world of men. 



■05 



Mrs. Tucker has been editorially connected with 
several local journals, and displays much ability as a 
writer of prose. Several stories from her pen have been 
well received. A member of no church, she has long 
been to some extent identified with the Universalist de- 
nomination, having contributed considerably to its pub- 
lications, and uniformly worshiping with it. But though 
making no profession of religion, not a little that she 
writes is warm with religious feeling, and breathes of a 
heart religiously inclined. The following is a compre- 
hensive recognition of divine presence : 

THOU. 

Father, O Father ! surrounded with ills, 
Dangers beset me, and evils betide, 
Yet through the valleys, and over the hills, 
Thou art my guide ! 

Wearily bearing my burden of woe ! 

Helpless humanity, sorely distressed ; 
On toward the heavenly mansions I go. 
Thou art my rest ! 

When through the stormy and perilous night, 

Feebly with faltering footsteps, I grope ; 
Having no refuge, nor shelter, nor light ; 
Thou art my hope ! 

What though the world my deficiency knows. 
What though it cavil, and censure and laugh ; 



io6 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. ] 

Safe and securely on Thee I repose, ] 

Thou art my staff ! f] 

When by the phantoms of evil pursued, ^ 

Fainting I fall, overpowered at length ; 

Yet shall I rise, in Thy spirit renewed, ; 

Thou art my strength ! i 

Down in the dreary and desolate tomb, 

Low lie my perishing idols in dust ; | 

Yet through bereavement, and anguish, and gloom, ^ 

Thou art my trust ! ^ 

Pale are the brows, and the lips I have pressed, 

Pulseless the hearts that had loved to the end ; 'i 

Lord ! Thou hast taken them into Thy rest, ] 

Thou art my friend ! I 

Life hath no beauty my heart to ensnare, ,i 

Death hath no terror my soul to appall ; .' 
Hid in Thy love's overshadowing care, 

Thou art my all ! .1 

•i 

In all save that part of the first stanza which un- j 

qualifiedly asserts universal salvation, the following, 1 

Originally contributed to T/ie Lady's Friend, will find \ 

sympathetic response from all who put forth prayer: J 

INVOCA TION 

Oh ! Thou most kind and merciful ! who never j 

Shut out a wanderer from the fold forever ; \ 

Look from the bastions of the shining city, ^ 
In tender pity. 



MARY F. TUCKER. 107 ^ 

Though we have walked in crooked ways forbidden, 5 

Keeping the talent which Thou gavest hidden ; \ 

Now when the shadows on our pathway lengthen, • A 

Sustain and strengthen \ 

Though we have wandered wilfully and blindly, '■; 

Treating the spirit of Thy love unkindly, -■ 

Yet when the night and darkness overtake us, ■ 

Do not forsake us. ■ ' 

Tempted and tried, and tossed, and torn, and shaken, - 

Blindly deceived, misguided and mistaken, '1 

Snares do beset, and dire ills befall us, • ''\ 

Oh disenthrall us ! \ 

Given to doubting and to unbelieving, '\ 

The rigfht rejecting, and the wrong receiving, ; 

Lord, we are weak ! yet grant us with our weakness ; 

Patience and meekness. ■ 

Led by false hopes, allured by beacon flashes, /" 

Finding at length but only dust and ashes, ^ 

Help us to see of earthly things the fleetness, : 

The incompleteness. - ij 

.<; 

Since the dear idols whom we love and cherish, I 

Fall to the earth and fade, and fail, and perish, 1; 

Grant in the awful anguish of affliction, '; 

Thy benediction. \ 

Bereaved and weary, worn with heavy trials, ' j 

With keen reproaches, and with sore denials; 

Through tribulations, tempest, flood and fire, 

Lead us up higher. -; 

Teach us our duty, give us strength to do it ; 1 

Show us the way, and help us to pursue it ; ^ 



io8 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Strengthen our purpose, aid our weak endeavor, 
Keep us forever ! 

In exquisite simplicity of tenderness, blent with rare 
strength of feeling, the following is not often excelled. 
The passion which it only half voices is subdued, but 
intense • 

/ LOVE HIM SO. 

I said no love shall my thought divide, 

I will put the hindering thing aside ; 

Its idle dreams to the weak belong, 

There are nobler aims for the brave and strong, 

Yet ever and always a sweet refrain 

Is ringing and singing through heart and brain, 

A melody tender, and soft, and low, 

I love him so ! I love him so ! 

A thousand lovers their loves forget, 
I will rise above and beyond it yet ; 
There are too many faces under the sun 
To live in the smiles of but only one, 
Yet ever and always, and everywhere. 
Beautiful eyes and sun-touched hair 
Follow and find me wherever I go, 
I love him so ! I love him so ! 

There are beacon-lights on the hills of fame, 
Honor and praise for the poet's name ; 
Chaplet of bay, and laurel crown, 
A grand applause and a great renown. 
Yet I sometimes think I would gladly miss 
Them all, and more, for a single kiss, 
And a moment's rest in the arms I know, 
I love him so ! I love him so ! 




T. W. BARKER. 




J. W. BARKER. 

JUR time of war was not largely productive of 
popular verse. Very much newspaper poetry 
appeared in those four years, it is true, but 
comparatively little of it was caught up and carried over 
the land. A few ringing lyrics met recognition, were 
read and sung everywhere, and will live because they de- 
serve to live. Islis. Julia Ward Howe's "Battle Hymn 
of the ReDublic" was one of these. "Fremont's Battle 
Hymn," by James G. Clark, was another. A number of 
lugitive pieces, incidental in character, became the waifs 
of our war literature, and only ceased their journeyings 
as waifs because they were incidental, and born of the 
time, and therefore lost interest when the time had gone 
by. Of this number was the following, entitled 

PICKING LINT. 

Plying the busy fingers 

Over the vestments old, 
Not with the weary needle, 

Not for grains of gold ; 
Thinking of fainting heroes, 

Out in the dreaiy night. 
Smitten in freedom's battle, 

First in the gallant fight : 



no WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Bright are the jewels from love's deep mint, 
God blesses the fingers while picking lint. 

Quicker — the Blood is flowing, 

Hundreds were slain to-day ; 
Every warm pulsation 

Is stealing the life away. 
" An hundred threads a minute, 
An hundred drops of gore," 
Is the sad and thrilling measure 
We have not learned before ; 
But the shadows are wearing a silver tint, 
God blesses the fingers while picking lint. 

We have clad the fallen heroes 

With garments our hands have made, 
By the lint we now are picking 

Shall the fearful tide be stayed ; 
We lift our hearts to heaven, 

And our Father's blessing crave — 
God bless our smitten country, 
Remember the fallen brave — 
O bright are the jewels from love's deep mint, 
God blesses the fingers while picking lint. 

The poem was written by a gentleman more widely 
known as a teacher than as a poet — Prof. J. W. Barker. 

Prof. Barker has written much in verse, and several 
of his productions have been extensively copied. He has 
written upon almost every sort of subject, but in general 
chooses a common-place theme, and treats it simply, 
without effort, and without especial heed to poetic finish. 
From his many poems it is almost impossible to select 



y. W. BARKER. Ill 

one or two that pre-eminently illustrate his habit of po- 
etical thought. The waif of his now current is 

BV-AND-BV. 

There's a little mischief-maker 

That is slealing half our bliss, 
Sketching pictures in a dreamland 

That are never seen in this ; 
Dashing from our lips the pleasure 

Of the present, while we sigh : 
You may know this mischief-maker, 

For his name is " By-and-By." 

He is sitting by our hearthstones 

With his sly, bewitching glance. 
Whispering of the coming morrow 

As the social hours advance ; 
Loitering 'mid our calm reflections. 

Hiding forms of beauty nigh : — 
He 's a smooth, deceitful fellow, 

This enchanter, " By-and-By." 

You may know him by his wincing, 

By his careless, sportive air ; 
By his sly, obtrusive presence. 

That is straying everywhere 
By the trophies that he gathers 

Where his somber victims lie ; 
For a bold, determined fellow 

Is this conqueror, " By-and-By." 

When the calk of duty haunt us. 
And the present seems to be 
All the time that ever mortals 



112 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Snatch from dark eternity, 
Then a fairy hand seems painting 

Pictures on a distant sky ; 
For a cunning little artist 

Is the fairy " By-and-By." 

" By-and-By" the wind is singing; 
" By-and-By " the heart replies ; 
But the phantom, just before us, 

Ere we grasp it, ever flies. 
List not to the idle charmer. 

Scorn the very specious lie ; 
Only in the fancy liveth 

This deceiver, " By-and-By." 

Pathetically simple is the following, which has been 
often copied : 

UNDER THE SNOW. 

Down in the valley under the hill, 
Droppeth the snow-flakes white and still, 
Wrapping the violet, near my feet, 
Cold and stiff in its winding sheet. 
Many, alas ! are the flowers that lie, 
Cold and pale, 'neath the winter sky, 
Many the dear ones sleeping low 
Under the sheet of driven snow. 

Press it gently, the precious mound — 
Pure and white be it ever found ; 
Holy angels their vigils keep 
Where my darling was laid in sleep. 
Cold and wintry the earth may be, 
Yet my spirit will stay with thee ; 



J. W. BARKER. 113 

Morning and night my heart will go 
Out in the valley under the snow. 

When through the wintry vales of time 
Wanders the spring of that heavenly clime, 
When these fetters of sin and death 
Melt away in its genial breath — 
When the light from the " golden hills " 
Earth's drear winter with gladness thrills, 
Precious flowers will bloom, I know, 
Lifeless now 'neath the winter snow. 

As we have said, Prof. Barker generally chooses 
common-place themes, and how he treats them this 
will fairly show : 

DARNING STOCKINGS. 

Were there never a standing record, 

To measure time's rapid flight. 
Were there never a clock or dial, 

I should know it were Saturday night ; 
I should know by the pile of stockings 

In the basket on the floor, 
That the "six days' work" was ended, 

And another week was o'er ; 

And the balls upon the table 

Of white and twisted yarn, 
The needle, smooth and shining. 

That was only made to "darn ;" 
And the patient, busy stitching, 

With the weaving to and fro. 
While a careful eye is watching 

For the rents in heel and toe. 

9 



114 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

And every breach is mended 

In a manner most complete — 
A dozen, neat and tidy, 

For as many busy feet ; 
Then off in the quiet dreamland 

With a spirit gentle and light, 
The pale and thoughtful watcher 

Is welcoming Saturday night. 

Let us learn from darning stockings 

A lesson of patient love, 
From the midst of the selfish shadows 

Let our spirits mount above ; 
The children of woe, we '11 befriend them, 

Whoever the sufferers be. 
We '11 seek for their faults but to mend them 

With " stitchings " of charity. 

Prof. Barker is yet on the morning side of fifty. 
He was born near the eastern shore of Lake Cham- 
plain, in Vermont. His father was Nathan B. Barker, 
of the real Puritan stock — fought in the war of 1812 — 
while his father was a Green Mountain Boy, of revolu- 
tionary memory. It was in New Hampshire, whither 
his parents had removed, that Prof Barker began his 
school life, and there he fitted for college, entering the 
school-room though, if we mistake not, instead of col- 
lege halls. In 1845 he came to Western New York, and 
in this section has most of his subsequent life been 
spent, behind the teacher's desk, or in the editor's sanc- 
tum. For the past eight or ten years he has been fre- 



y. W. BARKER. 115 

quently engaged in conducting Teachers' Institutes un- 
der appointment by the State Superintendent. 

As a teacher Prof. Barker has been uniformly suc- 
cessful, and in the profession of teaching he takes high 
rank. Few men have more friends among the teachers 
of the State than has he. The fact that he was elected 
President of the State Teachers' Association in 1868, 
testifies to his popularity. He has three times read the 
annual poem before this Association, with marked ac- 
ceptance. One of these annual productions, entitled 
''Flats and Sharps," has been delivered by him on sev- 
eral other public occasions. He has often read poems 
before literary societies. In 1861 he appeared, as the 
poet, before certain societies of Hillsdale College, Mich., 
at their commencement gathering, and on commence- 
ment day the college gave him the degree of "A. M." 

Prof Barker took to writing very young, and when 
sixteen first enjoyed the sight of some of his verses in 
print. They were published in The Fai'-mers' Cabinet, a 
paper printed at Amherst, N. H., in the office in which 
Horace Greeley learned his trade. Since then his 
poems have been very numerous, and have appeared in 
various newspapers and magazines, the Buffalo Courier^ 
of late years, being his favorite medium of publication. 
He has contributed several poems to The Rural Home, 
one of which he has rarely excelled : 



1 1 6 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

MORNING'S ADVENT, 

Though long be the darkness, and dreary 

The story the night winds may tell, — 
O the shadows and mists from the mountains 

The coming of morn will dispel ! 
We are nearing the beautiful morning, 

That springs from the night of the years, * 

And the sunlight, so mellow and golden, 

Will drink all the dew of our tears. 

We grope in the midst of the shadows. 

And look for the prints by the shore. 
Of feet that have passed the " dark river," 

And shall walk in the darkness no more ; 
In the glow of the glimmering starlight. 

We can travel the wearisome way. 
And we know that the deeper the darkness, 

The nearer the dawn of the day. 

The whispers of spring will awaken 

The dream of the redolent hours, 
And the touch of the beautiful sunlight 

Will open the tombs of the flowers ; 
We shall see from that summit of glory 

The night and the clouds roll away ; 
And the billows that sweep the dark ocean, 

Ai^e bearing us on to- the day ! 

Prof. Barker is a ready writer of prose, forcible, 
pointed, and terse. Doubtless the sanctum's discipline 
has helped him in this respect. He has done a great 
deal of editorial work. "For six years he was one of the 
editors of the New York Teacher, Three years he as 



J. W. BARKER, 117 

sisted in editing The Christian Freeman, printed in 
Chicago. Supplementing his school duties he has gen- 
erally furnished correspondence for one or more papers, 
use of the pen being his recreation. During the war he 
purchased an interest in the Daily Journal and Courier, 
and Weekly Intelligencer, at Lockport, and became co- 
editor thereof After three years of active journalistic 
labor, in which he made the daily and weekly issues of 
those papers strongly felt on the Union side, fire came, 
destroying their office and all its contents, and ruining 
him financially. Incendiarism did it, as was supposed, 
prompted by distaste for his strong loyal utterances. 

His accumulations gone, Prof Barker resumed 
teaching — in Buffalo, if we mistake not, where he now 
resides, — and so the editorial profession lost a worthy 
member, and that of teaching won back one of its best. 
He has written much upon educational topics, and all 
that he writes is characterized by comprehensiveness of 
thought, liberality of ideas, and vig^r of expression, 
joined to practical knowledge and native common sense. 

Prof Barker loves freedom, progression, truth, as 
does every man of poetic feeling. He is hopeful. One 
of his war pieces closed thus : 

Up through the battle and the storm 
The world is marching to the day 

When vile op-^ression's fiendish form 
Shall vanish in the strife away ; 



Il8 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

When light shall melt the frozen bars 
That shut from day the human soul, 

And, heard no more the strife of wars, 

The Right shall hold supreme control; 

But know by fire, severely tried, 

The gold from dross is purified. 

Every poet has sentimentalized over ''what we 
might have been." In a poem bearing that title Prof. 
Barker thus expressed himself: 

The ghost of eveiy murdered hour. 

Clad in its dread array. 
Darts ever 'mid our fairest walks 

To steal our joys away. 

% -^ % ^ -^ -^ 

O happy is the human soul 

Amid this world of sin. 
That never sees the dreary wrecks 

Of what it might have been. 

Prof. Barker is a useful man in community, — active, 
full of good words and works. He has long been a 
member of a Free Baptist Church, and a zealous servant 
in the Sunday School. We have room for but one more 
specimen of his verse, — on 

PURPOSE. 

Far back in the realm of the ages. 

When the stars of the morning sung, 
We ai-e told, in the lore of the sages. 



y. W. BARKER. 119 

That this gray old earth was young ; 
That it sprang from the womb of chaos 

At the feet of its God, 
And the glowing depth of azure, 

Was the shining path it trod. 

That the night slept on the waters, 

And the air was hushed and still, 
That the morning never painted 

The purple tinted hill ; 
That the sunny spring came never, 

Or the autumn's golden prime, 
But the cold and rayless winter 

Was the pendulum of time. 
O the gloom of that mystic darkness, 

O the measure of those years, 
When the depth of depths resounded 

With the " music of the spheres ! " 

But through those dreary chambers. 

There rang a mighty word. 
The earth with life responded, 

And the startled waters heard ; 
'T was the muttering of the earthquake, 

And it plowed the earth and sky. 
And over the dismal waters, 

It piled the furrows high. 

The mountain and the valley 

Lay in their quiet sleep, 
Till the sun lapped up the waters 

From the hollows of the deep, 
Till the wind breathed in its gladness 

From off the swelling strand, 



I20 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

And scattered the generous showers 
Athwart the thirsty land. 

Then the seeds of new-born beauty 

Seem scattered far and near, 
And the spring grows soft and radiant, 

And the summer flowers appear 
The autumn, ripe and golden 

Lies smiling on the plain, 
And the hill-tops and the forests 

Join in the glad refrain ; 

And out of the realm of ages, 

And over the shadows of night, 
There springeth a new creation. 

There blossoms a world of light ; 
And ever the spring hath music, 

And ever the summer a bloom. 
That laugh at the boast of winter, 

And scatter a sweet perfume. 

Then what if the spring time linger? 

Or what if the night be long ? 
And what if the muttering earthquake. 

Be the chorus of my song ? 
I knov/ that the morning cometh, 

I know there's a reilm of bliss, 
And a life of joy and beauty 

Will blossom out of this. 





Then -what if the spring-time linger? 
Or what if the night be long? " 



Pa^e I2C. 




M. A. KIDDER. 



OW many sympathetic souls there are ! souls 
full of hope and good cheer for all their kind — 
souls with a strong faith in God, such as can 
sing amid sorrow, and see blessings through disguise of 
pain, and be glad whatever come. Ever since David 
chanted psalms in the night, humanity has had its sweet 
hymnal for twilight seasons, as well as for brighter times ; 
and for every down -cast heart, in doubt and struggling, 
perplexed and questioning as to the end, discouraged and 
ready to faint, torn and bleeding, it may be, song has 
been fruitful of blessing. It is soothing as balm ; it 
mollifies like an ointment. Men listen for it as for a 
promise, and are comforted with the hearing. 

Among the bits of melody one oftenest hears by the 
way, is this entitled 

THE BRIGHT SIDE, 

There is many a vest in the road of life, 

If we only would stop to take it, 
And many a tone from the better land, 

If the querulous heart would wake it ! 
To the sunny soul that is full of hope, 

And whose beautiful tnist ne'er faileth. 
The grass is green and the flowers are bright, 

Though the wintiy storm prevaileth. 



122 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Better to hope though the clouds hang low, 

And to keep the eyes still lifted ; 
Foi- the sweet blue sky will soon peep through 

When the ominous clouds are rifted ! 
There was never a night without a day, 

Or an evening without a morning ; 
And the darkest hour, as the proverb goes, 

Is the hour before the dawning. 

There is many a gem in the path of life, 

Which we pass in our idle pleasure, 
That is richer far than the jeweled crown, 

Or the miser's hoarded treasure. 
It may be the love of a little child, 

Or a mother's prayers to heaven, 
Or only a beggar's grateful thanks 

For a cup of water given. 

Better to weav<^ in the web of life 

A bright and golden filling. 
And to do God's will with a ready heart. 

And hands that ai'e swift and willing. 
Than to snap the delicate, slender threads 

Of our curious lives asunder, 
And then blame heaven for the tangled ends, 

And sit and grieve, and wonder. 

Who first sang it .? We asked the question over and 
over before • it found answer. A long time we saw the 
poem in newspapers with no author's name attached. 
Later on it appeared credited to Charles Mackay ; but 
some intuition told us Mr. Mackay was not entitled to 
such credit. Finally we came to know the facts about 
its authorship, and somewhat concerning its author. 



M. A. KIDDER. J23 

The particular Waif of this chapter was written by 
Mrs. M. A. Kidder, whose name is often seen in Sunday 
School Singing Books. Where it first saw the light of 
print we can not say, or when it originally appeared. 
Mrs. Kidder is a lady quite well along in life, who sup- 
ports herself through literary effort, mainly of the rhyth- 
mic order. Possessed of an extremely sympathetic na- 
ture, and a natural faith in Divine mercy and goodness, 
she writes such verses as these we have quoted, out of -a 
full heart and abundant experience. 

Born in Boston, Mass., and growing up to woman- 
hood in Boston's literary atmosphere, she early took to 
writing for local periodicals, and continued thus writing, 
for the pure love of it, year after year. One of her 
earlier pieces we remember singing to a sad little melody, 
nearly a score of years ago, and the strains haunt us 
even now. It was an exhortation to mothers, and thus 
it ran : 

WA TCH, MOTHER. 

Mother ! watch the little feet, 

Climbing o'er the garden wall, 
Bounding through the busy street. 

Ranging cellar, shed and hall. 
Never count the moments lost, 
Never mind the time it cost, 
Little feet will go astray. 
Guide them, mother, while you may 

Mother ! watch the little hands, 
Picking berries by the way, 



1 24 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Making houses in the sands. 

Tossing up the fragrant hay. 
Never dare the question ask, 
*' Why to me the weary task?" 
These same little hands may prove 
Messengers of light and love. 

Mother ! v^atch the little tongue — 

Prattling eloquent and mild, 
What is said and vv^hat is sung, 

By the happy joyous child. 
Catch the word while yet unspoken, 
Stop the vow before 't is broken ; 
This same tongue may yet proclaim 
Blessings in a Saviour's name. 

Mother ! watch the little heart 

Beating soft and warm for you ; 
Wholesome Ifessons now impart ; 

Keep, O keep, the young heart true 
While extracting every weed. 
Sowing good and precious seed, 
Harvest rich you then may see, 
Ripening for eternity. 

Mrs. l|kidder received the first money ever paid her 
for writing, of Nathaniel Willis, father of N. P. Willis, 
and well known for almost half a century in periodical 
literature. That was thirty years ago. When war came, 
her husband, Ellis U. Kidder, entered the army of the 
Union, and died in defense of his country. Left with 
three children to care for, what had been largely a recre- 
ation became altogether earnest work, and during the 



M. A. KIDDER. 125 

past decade she has written much for song books and the 
newspapers, well encouraged by editors in Boston and 
New York, and by the popularity of her productions. 
One child was drowned, and her family now numbers 
one son, of twenty-five years, and a fair daughter, also in 
her twenties. 

One of Mrs. Kidder's songs, entitled ''Victory at 
Last, " was sung at Fort Sumter when they raised the old 
flag on its shattered walls. Of her numerous pieces, but 
a few are at our hand from which to select in making up 
this article, yet perhaps those we shall give of the few 
measure her style of thought, and the range of her 
poetic art, as well as any others might. She is practical 
rather than imaginative. In illustration of the fact, we 
give 

BUYING CROWN JEWELS. 

Plucking a thorn from the traveler's path, 
Turning away a neighbor's wrath ; 
Stretching a hand toward the needy soul, 
Pointing the way to the distant goal ; 
Lifting a fallen brother up, 
Sweetening the draught in the bitter cup ; 
Planting sweet flowers on a lonely grave, 
Seeking a single soul to save ; 
Sowing the seed 'gainst the Spring-tide rain, 
Watching in love by the bed of pain ; 
Heeding the orphan's plaintive cry. 
Wiping the tears from sorrow's eye ; 
Shunning to act the liar's part, 



126 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. \ 

Loving the truth with a fervent heart , . i 

Guarding from ill a friend's good name, \ 

Burying deep the tale of shame : ',; 

Working to earn the bread we eat, i 

... I 

Climbing the hill with patient feet ; * 

Dealing with men in an honest way, 1 

Seeing Heaven's light in the darkest day ; ■ 

Bidding the poor to the ample feast, \ 

Treating with kindness the poor dumb beast ; i 

Hoping for all things good and true, '; 

Trusting to God in what we do ,, 

Earning true riches as on we go — % 

Buying crown jewels as pui^e as snow. \ 

Quite different m versification, more forcible it may i 

be, is this which questions ^ 

WHO MISSES HIM. 

Gone ! and who misses him? ., 

Who, with heart swelling, \ 

Softly and mournfully i 

Passes his dwelling ? ; 
Who 'monor them all 

Felt the strong life-cord sever ? \ 

Who, of the throng \ 

That is surging forever? J 

Gone ! and who misses him ? ^ 

Friends, perhaps neighbors, \ 

Sigh at his funeral ; * ' \ 

Speak of his labors ; \ 

Strew on his grave \ 

A few blossoms of beauty ; i 



M. A, KIDDER. 12 » 

Read his white headstone, 
Then turn to their duty ! 

Gone ! and who misses him 

In the great city ? 
Who, from the beggar 

That 'wakened his pity, 
E'en to the many 

That courted his favor, 
Eating the salt 

That has now lost its savor ? 

Gone ! and who misses him ? 

Raise the latch lightly. 
Enter ths dafke'^ed room 

Where he slept nig'itly. 
There sits his weeping wife, 

Sister and broaier ; 
There are his little ones, 

There kneels his mother ! 

Ask not who misses him — 

Him who though lowly. 
Owned the sweet treasure 

That makes home so holy. 
Grander than monuments. 

Brighter than fame. 
Are their rich offerings 

Reared to his name. 

Believing, as she once expressed it to us, that 
"every day something beautiful comes into our lives, if 
we would but sift it out from the every-day trials, " Mrs. 



128 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Kidder is doing a sort of home-mission work in the 
hearts of mankind. There is great need. False ideas 
of what Kfe is or ought to be are too common. They 
may give way to truth, coming on wings of song. May 
the truth come to each soul, and abide therein ! 





CHARLES M. DICKINSON. 

HARLES DICKENS never wrote anything 
more exquisitely tender than the following, 
which, though generally appearing as a waif, 
has been very widely attributed to him : 

THE CHILDREN. 

When the lessons and tasks are all ended, 

And the school for the da/ is dismissed, 
The little ones gather around me. 

To bid me good-night and be kissed ; 
Oh, the little white arms that encircle 

My neck in their tender embrace ! 
Oh, the smiles that are halos of heaven, 

Shedding sunshine of love on my face ' 

And ^vhen they are gone I sit dreaming 

Of my childhood too lovely to last ; 
Of joy that my heart will remember, 

While it wakes to the pulse of the past, 
Ere the world and its wickedness made me 

A partner of sorrow and sin 
When the gloiy of God was about me, 

And the glory of gladness within. 

All my heart grows as weak as a woman's. 
And the fountains of feeling will flow, 
When I think of the paths steep and stony, 



130 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Where the feet of the dear ones must go ; 
Of the mountains of sin hanging o'er them, 

Of the tempest of Fate blowing wild ; 
Oh ! there 's nothing on earth half so holy 
As the innocent heart of a child ! 

They are idols of hearts and of households ; 

They are angels of God in disguise ; 
His sunlight still sleeps in their tresses, 

His glory still gleams in their eyes ; 
Those truants from home and from heaven — 

They have made me more manly and mild ; 
And I know now how Jesus could liken 

The kingdom of God to a child ! 

I ask not a life for the dear ones, 

All radiant, as others have done. 
But that life may have just enough shadow 

To temper the glare of the sun 
I w^ould pray God to guard them from evil. 

But my prayer would bound back to myself ; 
Ah ! a seraph may pray for a sinner, 

But a sinner must pray. for himself. ^^--^ 

The twig is so easily bended, 

I have banished the rule and the rod ; 
I have taught them the goodness of knowledge, 

They have taught me the goodness of God ; 
My heart is the dungeon of darkness. 

Where I shut them for breaking a rule ; 
My frown is sufficient correction ; 

My love is the law of the school. 

I shall leave the old house in the Autumn, 
To traverse its threshold no more ; 




" There are idols ot heart and oi households; 
They are angels of God in disguise." p„^e 130. 



CHARLES M. DICKINSON. 131 

Ah ! how I shall sigh for the dear ones, 
"• That meet me each mom at the door ! 

I shall miss the " good-nights" and the kisses, 

And the gush of their innocent glee, 
The group on the green, and the flowers 

That are brought every morning for me. 

I shall miss them at morn and at even. 

Their song in the school and the street ; 
I shall miss the low hum of their voices, 

And the tread ot their delicate feet. 
When the lessons of life are all ended. 

And death says, " The school is dismissed ! 
May the little ones gather around me 

To bid me good-night and be kissed ' 

Dickens wrote many beautiful things, in that poeti- 
cal prose into which he so easily and so often dropped, 
but he could never have written this, any more than we 
could have penned ''David Copperfield. " Certain 
minds think in rhythm, as it were, by instinct ; and one 
of these gave us "The Children," but it was not the 
mind of the great novelist. At times the prose of 
Dickens rose to a height that threatened to burst its duller 
channels into song : but he was notoriously without the 
faculty of versification ; and excepting the song of "The 
Ivy Green" in "Pickwick" and some trifling rhymes in 
prose form in the "Cricket on the Hearth," he never 
turned a passably smooth stanza in his life. Poetic 
thought he had, of course, but no facility of rightly- 
poetic execution, 



132 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

''The Children " was written by a partial namesake 
of the great story-teller — Charles M. Dickinson. 

Some careless compositor may have been originally 
responsible for the mistaken credit, owing to the similar- 
ity of names, as Mr. Dickinson formerly wrote his with- 
out the "middle letter." When the sweet poem was 
penned — which was in the early summer of 1863 — its au- 
thor was a schoolmaster at Haverstraw, on the Hudson. 
He had to meet the almost universal dislike of scholars 
to writing compositions, and he chose a happy way of 
meeting it, by proposing to write something himself, to 
read on a Saturday afternoon, if they would do the same. 
The proposal made and accepted, the teacher's part on 
the programme must be filled, and hence we have "The 
Children," written after school was dismissed on Friday 
afternoon, and before it opened on the following morn- 
ing. The verses were sent to a Boston paper for which 
Mr. Dickinson was then writing, and immediately won 
their way to popular favor, until it is now safe to say, 
there is scarcely a journal between the two oceans that 
has not republished them more than once in the twelve 
years of their existence. In the winter of 1863-4 the 
poem was published in the "School Girl's Garland, "a 
compilation of poetry by Mrs. C. M. Kirkland, and has 
since been copied into several other collections of verse. 
This is the simple history of a poem so pathetically, 
tenderly beautiful that it has found a place in almost 
«very household of the land, has been extensively copied 



CHARLES M. DICKINSON. 133 

in Europe, and has won the heart of every true teacher, 
as it has the admiration of all readers, by its delicate ap- 
preciation of youthful possibilities, its close sympathy 
with childhood, its warm love for childish ways. Simple 
as the poem is, it holds a rare sum of sweet philosophy 
within it. Indeed, the mystery of part of Christ's teach- 
ings seems to clarify in these lines : 

Those truants from home and from heaven, 
They have made me more manly and mild, 

And I know now how yesus could liken 
The Kingdom of God to a child ! 

Love of children is one of the purest elements in 
human nature, and it fairly glows in the whole poem. 
It is easy to see that the sympathetic teacher wrote it from 
the fullness of his heart, — wrote it, perhaps, in the 
school-room itself, whence childish forms had hardly 
vanished, where the ring of childish voices had hardly 
died away, and with every token of childish presence 
fresh and impressive. 

About two miles from the lovely little village of Low- 
ville, in Lewis County, N. Y., lifted a thousand feet 
above it, and overlooking a beauteous prospect, stands a 
brown old farm-house, in which, on the 15th of Novem- 
ber, 1842, Charles M. Dickinson was born. The very 
surroundmgs were sufficient to beget a poet. Nothing 
could excel the view within ten rods of the old hearth- 
stone. At one's feet nestles the village named ; beyond 
it trends away the broad Black River Valley, the river 



134 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



winding through it mile after mile, like a cord of silver, 
with every variety of landscape, field and forest ; and 
further still, stretching up towards the eastern horizon as 
far as the eye can reach, sweeps the unbroken forest of 
John Brown's Tract, with the dim peaks of the Adiron- 
dacks, and the dimmer summits of the Green Mountains, 
standing like sentinels on the remotest border. 

No wonder he took to rhyming at the early age of 
thirteen years. Nearly all his published poems were 
written in the three years preceding his departure from 
home in the spring of i860. After leaving home he fol- 
lowed teaching a year or two, then gave himself to lit- 
erary work as editor and correspondent, then read law 
with the Hon. Daniel S. Dickinson in Binghamton, and 
was admitted to the bar in that city in November, 1865. 
In 1866 he commenced the practice of his profession and 
also founded and edited a newspaper, in Northern Penn- 
sylvania, but returned to Binghamton in 1867, and since 
then has been diligently prosecuting his profession there 
and in the city of New York, where he now resides. 

The natural inclination of Mr. Dickinson is not to- 
ward law, but literature, and we believe the bar will ere 
long lose one of its ornaments, while the literary world 
will claim as wholly its own one with taste and talent of 
a high order, who should give us many poetical brothers 
and sisters of " The Children '' we love so well. 

The following poem was written several years ago. 



CHARLES M. DICKINSON. 135 

OF BESSIE. 

Ye ling' ring birds that still rejoice 

And sing of Edens whence ye came ! 
Ye would not sing a note for shame, 

If ye had heard my Bessie's voice. 

Ye stainless clouds whose purple grace 
The sunset heightens, with its flush ! 
I wonder not that ye should blush, 

Since ye have seen my Bessie's face. 

Ye stars that tremble in the skies, 

Half-peering through the lids of night, 
I know by your bedazzled sight, 

That ye have looked in Bessie's eyes. 

You modest Moon that sails the blue. 
No wonder that your face grows pale, 
And hides behind its snowy veil, 

"When Bessie turns her face on you. 

And all ye Heavens that o'er me roll. 
Ye could not show so pure a dome. 
If, in its fi-equent journeys Home, 

Ye had not felt my Bessie's soul. 

V^ery different in style and thought is this, penned 
t.r'>^e recently : 

THE DRUMMER BOY, 

In the battle-cloud's eclipse — 

And a shower of shot and shell, 
With his soul upon his lips, 

Benny fell ; 
And they laid him stiff and cold, 



136 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

'Neath the sod ; yet why repine ? 
When he reached the gates of gold, 
If he had the countersign, 
All is well. 

Hallowed is the path he trod, 

And the little, nameless knoll ; 
Earth has claimed his form, but God 

Claimed his soul ! 
Heaven's reveille at dawn. 

Reached it through the battle's din, 
When the last Relief came on, 

He was mustered out — mustered in 
Was his soul. 

Pilgrim clouds in mourning deep. 

As they journey through the skies, 
Pause upon their way, to weep 

Where he lies ; 
But the welcoming thunders roll. 

And their flash from star to sod, 
Paints the pathway of his soul. 
To the camp-fires of his God, 
In the skies. 

Perhaps the finest poem Mr. Dickinson has yet 
produced is the following, entitled 

HOW FAR FROM HE A VEN. 

Dear Love of mine, through whom I know 
The risen Christ still lives below, — 
Repeats His miracles of old, — 
Turns all the sunset into gold, — 
And with its touch of light divine, 



CHARLES M. DICKINSON. 137 

Turns all the river into wine,— 

Breathes Heaven's harmonics through the notes 

The birds drop from their velvet throats, — 

Sets all the world a dreaming of 

Her ancient Paradise of Love, 

And brings the skies so near to view ; — 

How many miles from Heaven are you? 

I know you 're near its boundary lines, 
For as we stood beneath the pines. 

Your soul went upward in a prayer ; 
You raised to Heaven your pleading eyes, 
And, lo ! the gates of Paradise 

Stood open wide a moment there ; 
I caught a glimpse of wondrous things, — 
A gleam of glory — flash of wings, — 

A sense of music filled the air 
And nearer, nearer bent the skies, 
Until a tender, nam.eless grace 
Slowly transfigured all your face ; 
And God's own glory strange and rare, 
Fell tangled in your shining hair. 

Come closer, love, and tell me true. 

How many miles from Heaven are you? 

I know your sainted feet have pressed 

The heavenly highways of the Blessed, 

And every foot of sky and sod, 

To the dear city of our God. 

I know you hear the choirs that sing 

In the fair palace of their King ; 

And by the holy thoughts that rise, 

Like timid angels, in your eyes, — 

Your pause to change with trembling tone^ 



138 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Your native language to our own, — 
By all the sweet, mysterious things 
That make me look to see your wings, 
I know a lovelier land than Earth, 
Contains the record of your birth. 

That you 're a Heavenly envoy here— 
An angel clothed in fair disguise ; 
You walk the world with weary feet. 

That you may make yourself more dear 
Than all the treasures 'neath the skies ; 
Then, like the North Star's magnet sway, — 
Loaned from its place, to wear by day, — 

You lead the soul from sin and care. 
O'er hills where Night and Morning meet, 

Straight up to Heaven, unaware. 
And as I follow, I behold 
Glad glimpses of the gates of gold ; 
And all my homesick soul forlorn. 
Longs for the land where it was born. 
No more Earth's magnet heart afar, 

Draws to itself each living thing ; 
The silver thread of every star 

Becomes a Heavenly leading-string. 
Far through the sky's celestial calm, 
I see the Paradise of Palm 

Through which the sunsets burn and blush 
And winds repeat their Heavenly psalm,^ — 

God's voice within the Burning Bush ; — 
And just beyond, the golden wall 

Where those we thought were in the grave, 

Send happy looks to us, and wave 
Their signs of welcome, over all. 
Some sunshine from Eternal Day, 



CHARLES M. DICKINSON, 139 

Falls here and there, about our way ; 

Some flowers in exile bloom to tell ^ 

The glorious gardens whence they fell ; 

And warm air currents flow by me, — 

The Gulf Stream of the Ethereal Sea,— 

And sometimes fan my Heavenward face 

With a strange touch of added grace. 

Like angel's breath or sweep of wing ; 
And we 're so near our resting place. 

The very birds come out to sing, 
To cheer us with their song and sight, 
And then fly back again, at night. 

I see the attending stars stoop down. 
And follow nightly, with your crown ; 
I see the pearly cloud that brings 
And hovers with your waiting wings ; 
And sometimes, in the waning light, 
I tremble lest you fade from sight. 
Oh, precious guide, I pray you, wait, 
If first you reach the Heavenly gate ; 
For well I know, if I pass through, 
'T will be that I 'm a part of you, 

And not for aught that I have done t 
For, all my earthly self, the true, 
The purest thoughts I ever knew, 
My noblest aims since life began, 
My hope, my faith in Christ and man, 
And all the love my life has known, 
Are all your own — are all your own. 




DELLE W. NORTON. 

DAM and his wife may have been highly blessed, 
in their first enjoyment of Paradise, but they 
lacked one of life's sweetest blisses. They had 
no courting time. They married in haste, and their de- 
scendants have done the leisurely repenting. So far as 
we have any record. Miss Eve never waited tremulously 
of a Sabbath evening for her lover's coming ; Adam 
never dressed himself carefully in his Sunday best and 
went forth lovingly to meet her. They missed one of 
the pleasures it were worth while being placed in a gar- 
den for. 

But the blissful cou'ting experience has one draw- 
back ; there is a misery in it for every Miss Eve — people 
will talk ! And tha" is how this bit of verse came to be 
written, entitled 

DO NOT SLAM THE GA TE. 

Harry ! pray don't laugh at me ! — 

But when you go so late, 

1 wish you would be careful, dear, 

And never slam the gale i 

For Bessie listens every night, 

And so does teasing Kate, 
To tell me next day what o'clock 

They heard you shut the gate ! 



142 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

'T was nearly ten last night, you know, 

But now 't is very late 
(We have discussed so many things); 

O do not slam the gate ! 

For if the neighbors hear you, they 

Will say our future fate 
We have been talking over, so 

You must not slam the gate ! 

I know 't will only be the truth. 

But then, I wish they 'd wait 
To canvass our affairs until 

Well — pray do n't slam the gate ! 

At least not now. But by-and-by, 

When in " our " home, I wait 
Your coming, I shall always like 

To hear you slam the gate ! 

For whether you go out or in. 

At early hour or late, 
They will not care to tease me, th^ 

About that horrid gate ! 

We have seen the whimsical waif repeatedly, in 
newspapers, as have thousands of other people, and 
have enjoyed its literal portraiture of feminine distress, 
as have they. It is the only waif of a humorous nature 
which we have introduced in this series, and we give it 
because it is truly a waif, its authorship being rarely 
recognised, and because the hand that wrote it has 
penned many beautiful poems that have been more or 
less widely copied. 




''She sailed across the harbor bar, 
And sunshine gJimmered in her track, 
But morning's light or evening's star 
Shines not upon lier coming back." 



Page 143. 



DELLE W. NORTON. 



^43 



It was written by Delle E. Whitney, of Lyons, N. 
Y., quite a number of years ago, and appeared first as 
set to melody, in sheet music form. Produced for the 
concert-room, something humorous having been asked 
of Miss Whitney for such use, it was often sung by a 
pretty well known singer at that time, and finding its 
way into The Ladies' Repository it went the rounds — is 
going yet. It is the first and last bit of humorous verse 
its author ever attempted, and is scarcely even regarded 
by her as humorous, inasmuch as it expressed the real 
feeling of a young lady living opposite the author's 
house, who had been regularly teased about ''that 
horrid gate,' 

A poem less frequently copied than this, yet often 
seen, and echoing a common experience so truly that it 
touches the popular heart, is this, originally published 
in The Galaxy 

THE MISSING SHIP. 

I watched for hei" from morn till night 

The ship I launched upon a day 
When seas were smooth and skies were oright, 

And favoring winds blew o'er the bay ! 

I 'd freighted her with many a care, 

With tears I 'd shed and sighs repressed, 

And bade her take my ventures where 
She could exchange them all for — rest. 

She sailed across the harbor-bar, 

And sunshine glimmered in her track 



144 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

But morning's light or evening's star 
Shines not upon her coming back ! 

And where she is I cannot tell ! 

Her cargo was of such a sort 
It may be she can neither sell 

Nor barter it in any port. 

And so she sails in fruitless quest 

O'er seas reflecting alien skies, — 
Yet sailing east or sailing west 

Her pennant never homeward flies. 

'T is possible the way she 's lost, 

Or sufl"ered shipwreck on some shore ; 

But whether she 's becalmed or tossed 
By tempests, she returns no more ! 

Therefore I 'm looking out alway. 

With eyes tear-blinded, o'er the sea ; 

In hope she will sail back some day 
With rest for my poor heart and me. 

Miss Whitney was born at Fort Edward, Saratoga 
county, N. Y., January ist, 1840. Her girlhood was 
passed in the town of Moreau, but she attended school 
mainly in Fort Edward village, at the Academy. 
Brought up by her grandparents, the first fifteen years of 
her life were very little watched over. She lived much 
out of doors, and alone, and came to feel a near sympa- 
thy with nature when very young. She early manifested 
a fondness for books, and was allowed to give herself 
over almost entirely to reading, writing and dreaming, 



DELLE W.NORTON. 145 

which she enjoyed by turns. When fifteen, she became 
an invalid, and for a long time battled against disease, 
her only solace still being her pen and her books. 

She commenced writing at an early age, and her 
first published article appeared in The Cultivator, Boston, 
in her twelfth year. It was entitled ''Jerusalem." A shy, 
sensitive girl, the habit of seclusion and secrecy strong 
upon her, she shrunk from telling any one of her litera- 
ry venture, and believing her initial recognition quite un- 
known in the little village. Greatly to her horror, how- 
ever, when she went to the post-office for her paper, the 
clerk quietly ejaculated ''Jerusalem !" as he passed it into 
her hand, and she knew the secret was out. 

One of her earlier poems, first printed in The Torch- 
light, Xenia, O., in 1855, was accounted by the editor of 
that journal of much merit, judging from a foot-note ap- 
pended by him, which said: — "To the one who can read 
this little gem without moist eyes and a trembling heart, 
there is no pathos in any possible form of language." It 
is as follows : 

■ CALL ME NOLONGER THINE. 

Call me no longer thine ! The sunny bowers 

Where we have roamed will never know me more ! 

For thou mayst visit them in future hours, 

But my feet, standing on the Unseen Shore, 
Shall walk no more with thine ! 

Turn from my brilliant eyes ! They only give thee 

Plopes that mislead, and falsely flatt'ring dreams. — 



146 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Their lafmbent light is flashing to deceive thee 
With beautiful but transitory gleams, — 
Call me no longer thine ! 

I shall not long be here ! Death's icy finger 

Will soon to parian white my forehead chill; — 

To slow, sad rhythm my heart-beats strike and linger, 
And at its touch its pulses will stand still, — 
Call me no longer thine ! 

Upon my cheek a red, red rose is blooming. 

Whose blush grows deeper as it nears decay. 

And fires burn in my veins that are consuming 
The vigor of my youthful life away ! 
Call me no longer thine ! 

O, dark will be the shadow resting o'er thee, 

And thou wilt shrink from the world's cheerless tone, 

For mem'ries of the past will flit before thee. 

And mock thee with the pleasures thou hast known 
In days when I was thine ! 

God comfort thee! for thou wilt be aweary 

With thy vain longing for my smile and song ; 

And thou wouldst gladly leave the world, made dreary 

Through losing me, to be where I am gone 

And am no longer thine ! 

And may He help thee in the hour of anguish 

When the blow falls, — and in the calm, so rife 

With passionless despair, when thou Malt languish 

Through the slow fever, that the world calls Life, 
Because I am not thine ! 

Yet sink thou not, beloved ! It is only 
A little while ere to the vernal strand 



DELLE W. NORTON-. 147 

Of heavenly shores thy barque shall come, and lonely 
Thou shalt be nevermore, for in that land 
I shall be always thine! 

Three or four years after this first appeared, as we 
have stated, it was put forth as new, in a Philadelphia pa- 
per, the title only being changed, as was th^ last line of 
each verse, to "Call me no more thine own," and attrib- 
uted to Ohve F. Paine, of Orwell, Vt., who had very boldly 
appropriated it and deceived the editors. Later it went 
the rounds of the papers again, attributed to " a New Or- 
leans lady, in view of an immediate departure to the bet- 
ter land," when W. T. Tinsley, editor of 2'he Lyons Re- 
publican, wrote quite a long article stating when, where, 
and how it had originally been put forth. 

Miss Whitney's verse is generally very correct, and 
has sometimes an unusual element of strength in it, as in 
this from The Christian Union, entitled 

AT REST. 

Has Death come to her at last? 
Are her days of darkness past ? 

Is she gone ? 
Well, her life-work is all done. 
Fold the white hands on her breast — 

Let her rest ! 

We should shed some bitter tears, 
Had she known no doubts, or fears. 

And no pain ; 
But her thwarted life in vain 



148 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

Strove its griefs to overleap 
Why then weep ? 

In the thirty years scarce sped, 
She was born and married. Dead, 

Lies she, here. 
And around her naiTow bier 
Ghosts in legions with us sit. 

Watching it ! 

Ghosts of hopes too long deferred ; 
How she saAv them die, no word, 

And no moan. 
From her lips (since she is done 
Henceforth with each sob, and sigh,) 

Will reply. 

For she rests, you see ! The balm 
Of Death's solemn, voiceless calm, 

Heals each wound'; 
And the place seems holy ground. 
Where a soul so tired of strife 

Enters Life ! 

Life immortal ! Let us pray 
God will give her leave, to-day,' 

To fill up I 
With the wine of Joy, the cup 
Held inverted here by Fate, 

In her hate ! 

She was very good and fair ; 
How could He let pain and care. 
And deceit, 



DELLE W. NORTON. X49 

And base wrong, with rampant feet. 
Trample her to death this way? 
Tell me, pray ! 

God forgive me ! For at best, 
Life 's a problem, and the test 

That applies, 
Not upon the surface lies ! 
All depends on what is gained— 

Or attained ! 

L 

Her life-problem, God, to-day, 
Solves in His own righteous way. 

She for bread 
Of Love, lifted empty hands, — instead 
He puts heaven in them ! 'T is best ! 

Let her rest. 

Miss Whitney was married Jan. ist, 1874, toH. B. 
Norton, of Rochester, in which city she now resides. 
She has had a varied experience, and it is not strange if 
somewhat of the pathos of actual living now and then 
thrills through what she writes. She has known rare joys, 
and peculiar sorrow ; and yet, amid all the changes of 
the years, in a brave and unfaltering faith, she has kept 
on singing. She has taken up burthens cheerfully, and 
borne them as she might. She has believed, as it seems 
all might believe, if they would, that beyond the clouds 
of to-day there is ever a to-morrow of sunshine sweet and 
clear. This little Scotch ballad, contributed to Scribner's, 
is not more sad and pathetic than some chapters in her 
life history ; 



^5o 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

GANGIN AW A, 

What is it that maks ye greet sae, Jeannie, 
And spier me wi' leuks sae wild ? 

Ye shiver as though in my place a wraith 
Looked mockingly out and smiled ! 

Have I grown sae ghaistly, and white as that ? 

Do ye ask what maks my eyes 
Wear a leuk as o* one that's beyond the world. 

Though not yet up in the skies ? 

*Tis because I'm ^angin a wa, Jeannie, — 

I *m gangin slowly awa 
To the narrow house that they tell us of 

Where " there is nae room for twa ! " 

Nae smell o' the daisies will reach me there, 

Nae note that the mavis sings, 
Though he trill his sweetest or saddest songs, 

Through all o' the coming springs ' 

Yet I am nae sorry to go, Jeannie, 

The coolness and rest leuk sweet. 

For my eyes are heavy wi' unshed tears. 
My heart is too tired to beat ! 

'Tis the auld, auld story ower again, — 

A tale o' the common kind, — 
How twa youthfu' hearts may be filled wi' love, 

And foolish eyes may be blind 

For blind we maun surely haebeen, Jeannie, 

And daft, all the world aboon. 
To forget that I was a peasant girl, 

And he was the great Laird's son 



DELLE W. NORTON. 

But I was sae hungry for love, Jeannie, 

The world was sae bleak, and sae wide, 

And I had nae father or mither to care, 
Nae brother or sister to chide 

Sae when into our twa young hearts, Jeannie, 
Cam the king called Love, to reign, 

We forgot a lady o' high degree 
Waited him over the main ! 

A bride the old Laird had betrothed him to 
When the twa were babes, I ween, 

For she had a title, and gold, and lands. 
But her face he had never seen ! 

Alas ! and alas ! for us baith, Jeannie, 
That all through the simmer's bloom 

We saw not her beautiful English hands 
Were digging our love a tomb ! 

For as cruel as death that strikes out life, 

Cam his father's stern decree. 
He must bring his bride ere the autumn waned, 

From that land across the sea ! 

Ah ! God o' the desolate help us, Jean ! 

Wi' a face as white as snaw, 
And eyes that were wild wi' t' lurid fire. 

He kissed me and sailed awa ! 

And ever and ever since that sad hour 

When the fatal message sped, 
And the ship set sail for the English coast, 

I ha'e wished that I were dead ! 

Dead ! And shut out frae the glens in bloom, 
The withered leaves in their fall, 



51 



1^2 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

And shut from the sight o' the ship that brings 
That fair young bride to the hall ! 

Far better. — far better for him, and me, 
Would it be if the brackens green 

Grew tenderly over my head and heart, 
And the gowans blossomed between ! 

And sae I am gangin awa, Jeannie, — 

I 'm gangin slowly awa, 
To the narrow house that they tell us of 

Where " there is nae room for twa ! " 

Yet unto the rune o' the waves o' Death 
My thoughts in one measure run, 
" Forever and ever throughout the world 
The will o' the Lord be done." 



Several poets have accounted in their rhymes for the 
robin's crimson breast, but there is no more tender legend 
with regard to it than is found in these lines, written 
quite a long time ago, unique in the thought they em- 
body, quaintly suggestive in the reflection with which 
they end. 

TO THE ROBIN REDBREAST, 

On fair Brittannia's isle, bright bird, 

A legend strange is told of thee, — 
'T is said thy blithesome song was hushed 

While Christ toiled up Mount Calvary, 
Bowed 'neath the sins of all mankind, 

And humbled to the very dust 



BELLE TV. NORTON. 153 

By the vile cros?, while viler man 

Mocked with a crown of thorns the Just. 
Pierced by our sorrows, and weighed down 

By our transgressions,— faint, and weak^ 
Crushed by an angry Judge's frown, 

And agonies no words can speak, — 
'T was then, dear bird, the legend says 

That thou, from out His crown, didst tear 
The thorns, to lighten the distress, 

And ease the pain that He must bear, 
While pendant from thy tiny beak 

The gory points thy bosom pressed, 
And crimsoned with thy Saviour's blood 

The sober brownness of thy breast ! 
Since which proud hour for thee and thine, 

As an especial sign of grace 
God pours like sacramental wine 

Red signs of favor o'er thy race ! 
The tale is touching. True or false 

We know not, but we see a fire, 
Blood-red, is burning o'er thy heart ; — 

And hear thy liquid notes aspire 
To cleave the very heavens. So sing 

Thy joyous song of praise, while we 
Listen, and learn to trust in Him 

Who cares for even such as thee ! 



We have already devoted considerable space to Mrs. 
Norton's productions ; yet should hardly do her justice 
did we not reproduce in full, the finest poem, in many re- 
spects, we have yet seen from her pen, which was pub- 
lished in The, Galaxy about three years ago : 



154 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

MY KINGDOM. 

Crown me a Queen, — ye who love me best,— 
Crown me a Queen, though I stand 

Unknown, in a realm where no subjects 
Shout my fame over the land. 

Bring me a scepter and purple robe, 
Put the seal ring on my hand ! 

Where, do you ask, does my empire lie? 

Are all its fortresses. strong? 
Have I no fear that marauders 

May pillage its wealth before long? 
No, — for my realm is intangible, — 

Only a — kingdom of song ! 

The manifold gifts of the Universe 

Minister unto my need, 
Its Unities, and its Diversities, 

Up to the Beautiful lead. 
Till my soul, filled with the harmony, 

Sings like Pan's musical reed ! 

It sings with a passionate fervor, 
A wonderful rhythm and stress, 

It sings till the strength, and the sweetness, 
Make my heart faint with excess ; 

But the beautiful strains die unwritten, — 
No language their soul can express ! 

Can I put any music on canvas ? 

Or paint the perfume of the rose 
Can I bring you the mists from the mountain 

Or show how the violet blows 
Can I give back in all of their whiteness 

The crystals of last winter's snows ? 



lELLE W. NORTON, 

Neither can I, with utmost endeayor, 

Unspeakable sweetnesses fling 
Into limited human expression, 

Else infinite music would ring 
Its very soul out, in the simplest 

Or saddest of songs that I sing 1 

But I shall be taught what to carol ;- 

Invisible spirits of air 
Will paint flowers for my inspiration, 

And teach the young birds when and where 
To warble the songs I may copy 

Because neither studied nor rare. 

The sprite of the wind harps shall order 
The south and the west wind to play 

A symphony, matching the music 
Composed by the sweet wacer fay, 

While bees, birds and brooks shall be rivals 
In teaching me what I must say ! 

The classical Thespis shall tell me 
How tragical numbers find tongue, 

And Thebes flings her widest gates open 
To give me what Pindar has sung ; 

While the glorious Queen of Song — Sappho, 
Sings, throned the monarchs among ! 

Anacreon's notes from Ionia 

Ring, mellowed with time, from the lyre, — 
I hear the grand strains of blind Homer, — 

Feel Petrarch's invincible fire ; 
While on floods of song, ancient and modern, 

My soul rises higher and higher ! 



15s 



156 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

And so, though no brazen-mouthed trump 
May herald my fame through the land, 

Still an heir to the purple and ermine, 
Sceptered, and crowned, I shall stand 

A Queen in my own little province, 
With Peace at my royal right hand 





FRANCIS M. FINCH. 

T is not strange, perhaps, that our great Civil 
War called forth few poetical expressions which 
survived it. Indeed, it called forth very few that 
made themselves widely felt, even while the conflict waged. 
And when peace came — that glad time which people 
should most gladly sing — hardly a verse gave rhythmic 
greeting to which the popular heart made response. No 
sympathetic muse rose to the occasion. The poetry of 
Peace was dumb so far as any universal or representative 
utterance was concerned ; or it spoke only in the hearts 
and through the hand-clasp of those whom war had long 
separated, met again in the joy of a great duty grandly 
done. Presently it breathed out — and so sweetly that 
the world almost wept — in the blossoms on their graves 
for whom peace had but benedictions. 

In the summer of 1867, two years or more after the 
smoke of battle had cleared away, this little news para- 
graph appeared in a metropolitan journal : 

The women of Columbus, Mississippi, animated by nobler 
sentiments than are many of their sisters, have shown themselves 
impartial in their offerings made to the dead. They strewed 
flowers alike on the graves of the Confederate and the National 
soldiers. 



158 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



Through the deed which these few lines recounted, 
the real poetry of Peace spoke, at last. We all heard it, 
and yet only one man of us all tenderly spelled out its 
syllables so that each should understand. When he had 
done it, this is how it ran : 

THE BLUE AND THE GRAY. 

By the flow of the inland river, 

Whence the fleets of iron had fled, 
Where the blades of the grave-grass quiver. 
Asleep are the ranks of the dead : — 
Under the sod and the dew ; 

Waiting the iudgment day ; 
Under the one, the Blue ; 

Under the other, the Gray. 

These in the robings of glory. 

Those in the g oom of defeat ; 
All with the battle blood gory, 

In the dusk of eternity meet ; — 
Under the sod and the dew ; 

Waiting the judgment day ; 
Under the laUrel, the Blue ; 
Under the willow, the Gray. 

From the silence of sorrowful hours 

The desolate mourners go, 
Lovingly laden with flowers, 

Alike for the friend and the foe ; — 
Under the sod and the dew ; 

Waiting the judgment day ; 
Under the laurel, the Blue ; 
Under the willow, the Gray, 



FRANCIS M. FINCH. 

So, with an equal splendor. 

The morning sun-rays fall, 
With a touch impartially tender, 

On the blossoms blooming for all ;— 
Under the sod and the dew: 

Waiting the judgment day ; 
Broidered with gold, the Blue ; 
Mellowed with gold, the Gray. 

So, when the Summer calleth 

On forest and field of grain, 
With an equal murmur falleth 
The cooling drip of the rain ; 
Under the sod and the dew ; 

Waiting the judgment day; 
Wet with the rain, the Blue ; 
Wet with the rain, the Gray. 

Sadly, but not with upbraiding. 

The generous deed was done ; 
In the storm of the years, now fading, 
No braver battle was won ; 
Under the sod and the dew ; 

Waiting the judgment day; 
Under the blossoms, the Blue ; 
Under the garlands, the Gray. 

No more shall the war cry sever, 
Or the winding rivers be red ; 
They banish our anger forever 

When they laurel the graves of our dead* 
Under the sod and the dew ; 

Waiting the judgment day ; 
Love and tears for the Blue ; 
Tears and love for the Gray. 



159 



, l6o WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

How clear the meaning seemed ! It found an echo 
all over our broad land. Crystallized in print, first in 
The Atlantic Monthly for September of the year named, 
this syllabled utterance was wafted on the white wings of 
the newspaper from one end of the country to the other. 
With the blossoms of every recurring May since then it has 
re-echoed itself, growing sweeter and sweeter year by 
year, its sympathy, and loving charity widening more and 
tnore until the strife is but a memory, and 

" Dying, the sadness of funeral dirges, 

Fading the musketry's roar; 
Conflict's deep ocean in murmuring surges 
Kisses the Present's still shore ! " 

This man through whom the poetry of Peace spoke 
so beautifully, was not widely known as Poesy's chosen 
medium of expression. He had rarely written for public 
perusal. His name was in no wise familiar to newspaper 
readers. Hundreds who had courted the muse for years 
and yet had never won so worthy recognition therefrom, 
had a wider reputation than had he. 

''The Blue and the Gray " was penned by F. M. 
Finch, Esq., of Ithaca, N. Y. — a gentleman of fine mind 
and careful culture, recognized by all who know him as 
the possessor of rare literary gifts, but modest and retiring 
in the extreme. 

Francis Miles Finch was born in Ithaca, about the 
\ , year 1828. His father was then a merchant in the village 



FRANCIS M. FINCH. i6l 

named, but now lives in Aurora. Mr. Finch's early ed- 
ucation was obtained at the Lancastarian School, in Ith- 
aca, and at the Ithaca Academy. Having entered the 
sophomore class of Yale College, he graduated with 
honor in 1845. After graduating he studied law with Mar- 
cus C. Riggs and Judge Walbridge; commenced prac- 
tice with the latter, after admission to the bar ; and con- 
tinued in that business relation until Walbridge became 
County Judge. The firm of Boardman & Finch was 
then organized, and had a large practice until its disolu- 
tion, when its senior member was made Judge of the 
Court of Appeals. 

Mr. Finch 's reputation as a lawyer is excellent, and 
as an orator he is held in high esteem '*in his own 
country," where he permits his voice sometimes to be 
heard. A memorial address delivered at the dedication 
of a monumental tablet in the Presbyterian church at 
Aurora, on Cayuga Lake, was full of beauty and elo- 
quence. Upon the tablet was engraved the names of 
thirty-seven Union soldiers, who went from the town of 
Ledyard, Cayuga county, and in these words he recog- 
nized their love and memories of home : 

This is the place : in their own town, from which these sol- 
diers marched to the great war ; whose hills and valleys and nest- 
ling cottages, whose kind home faces, and dumb farm pets, and 
cool grays of the dawn, and rich reds of the sundown, they car- 
ried with them in their hearts ; carried with them to the dark and 
murderous swamps of the Peninsula and longed for their own dry 



1 62 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

and blooming uplands ; carried with them to the blistering fields 
of the Carolinas, and wished for the cool brow of their Aurora 
ridges ; carried with them to the turbid and muddy waters that 
stained and mottled the Mississippi wharves, and pined for the 
clear blue and pure green of their own dainty diamond of a lake. 
Poor boys ! No man knows how frequent and how bitter were 
their longings ! 

To write such a poem as *'The Blue and the Gray," 
an intense sympathy with the class it memorializes was 
prerequisite. The poem itself was hastily penned, and 
apparently the outcome of a sudden inspiration, but it 
was really the fruit of years of sympathetic silence. Un- 
less one had felt the thrill of unshed tears over the shed- 
ding of Northern and Southern blood, he could not have 
written what has so often caused the tears to flow. In the 
memorial address from which we have quoted, Mr. Finch's 
sympathy is from first to last manifest, and we make this 
extract, as showing how it crystallizes into words, and 
how really poetical is even Mr. F's prose 

Here for the last time, as we halt these soldier shadows upon 
the verge of the unseen world, at the very parting of the veil, can 
we see them form in line to receive our sad salute, and then disap- 
pear into the misty tents of eternity. Halt ! — Soldiers of the 
Union ! those for whom you fought salute you : those for whom 
you died salute you : a freed and enfranchised race salute you : Lib- 
erty, with the stain washed from her brow, salutes you : a flag, 
untorn, undimmed, salutes you ; a nation, grateful, thankful, sad 
salutes you ! Soldiers, adieu ! To the rest of the spirit land, to 
the presence of your God — March ! I see them touch their caps 
and fall into shadowy line, and one by one disappear. Do they 



FRAuVCIS M. FINCH. 



163 



ever return to us? Do they march and countermarch about us in 
the sleep of the midnight? Do they sit around the watchfires which 
the moonlight makes in the rifts of the forest, and talk of the= • 
ended battles ? Do they stand on guard beside us? Do they sen- 
tinel our homes ? Are they hovering near us to-day? Vainly we 
ask. Only the dreaming poet, with sad eyes far-reaching ; and the 
inspired artist, with brush dipped in the colors of a rapt reverie, 
can answer for us. 

Do you remember the " Watch on the Potomac,'* drawn by 
the marvelous pencil of one whose genius fills the world with 
laughter, but sometimes touches the inmost soul of sympathy? 
The moon was just risen above the river, solemn and white ; like 
snow its radiance drifts across the shadowy water, and touches the 
shore where sleep at Arlington so many of the war's countless 
dead. Ghost-like and dim, among the shadows of the cemetery, 
and the head-stones of the grave§, paces a soldier sentinel. The 
moonlight touches the barrel of his musket and lights it into sil- 
ver ; touches his tangled beard, and makes it white with watching ; 
touches the letters on his belt, and makes them flash like steel : but 
all else is dark and shadowy ; and there, all the night, till the grey 
dawn breaks, alone among the silent graves, the spirit sentinel 
walks. Let us believe it, my friends. Let us believe that not an 
impassable gulf, but a river, bridged lies between us and the bet- 
ter land : that those who have gone before us do yet remember 
their earthly pilgrimage, and their earthly friends ; that the spirits 
of the just do hover about us, and know, with the master knowl- 
edge of Heaven, all that we say and do : and so believing, let us 
feel that this memorial becomes precious, that, perhaps, those 
watch it whom we never hear or see ; and, at all events, that Su- 
preme Love, which counts and guards the very sparrows as they 
fly, and looks with pleasure on the least unselfish act, beholds our 
work, and accepts the deed. 



1 64 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

The address concluded with some tender reflections 
upon the days of Peace, and they are so in harmony with 
the spirit of our waif that we may be pardoned for yet 
another extract : 

Once in the recent summer, wandering deep into the silence 
of the northern wilderness, I came upon a channel, the tortuous 
link between the waters of two peaceful lakes. The channel 
banks were lined with a wealth of wild roses, training their warm 
coloring for many miles, while its surface was covered with 
white waxen lilies, whose snowy cups sat lightly on the water, 
and were made more purely white by the red rose framework of 
their setting. And so the days of peace seemed whiter for the 
long, red years of war : seemed worthier for their weary and ter- 
rible cost. Let not their enjoyment make us forgetful or un- 
grateful. Let every soldier's grave be sacred, and grow beautiful 
under the June blossoms strewn by loving hands. Let every sol- 
dier's name be rescued from oblivion, saved upon monument or 
tablet for the respect and love of after ages. Let this memorial 
last as long as the walls which uphold it : as the ceaseless voice of 
the waves that sing to it their lulling song in the calm, and shout 
their war-cry in the storm. And let there be forever blended 
with it, as over some shadowy landscape the skillful artist flashes 
a light from an unseen orb, the memory of him whose hand has 
silently thrown a light across the darkness of almost forgotten 
graves, and carved these soldiers' names in letters that will not 
fade. And may this memorial prove, like that costlier one, raised 
by a nation's gratitude at Gettysburg, for every soldier whose 
name it bears the lasting preserver of his fame ! 

When the leaves were sere and crimson, 

And crisp the morning air. 
And wound the breath of Autumn 



FRAXCIS M. FINCH. 1 65 

Through the forest's golden hair. 
On a field of death and silence, 

Where the battle storm had blown, 
Came a nation, clad in mourning, 

With a monumental stone. 

All around them lay the dead 

Underneath the flowers asleep, 
All above them smiled the sky 

Gilding warm the rocky steep, 
And with words of shining glory 

From a golden lip and tongue 
They made the mountain sacred 

Where the battle bugles rung. 
While the prayer is floating upwards, 

Sits apart an angel form, 
With a scroll like misty fleece clouds 

That follow up the storm, 
And she writes with diamond pencil 

Each buried soldier's name ; 
And the angel form is Justice, 

And the angel pen is Fame ! 

Mr. Finch wrote a few college songs, while at Yale, 
and on several occasions since, while gathered with his 
fellow alumni, has delivered poems there. With these 
exceptions he has produced little rhyme, so far as we are 
aware. The following lyric, in striking contrast to that 
already quoted, as to spirit and style, has been printed 
often, and shows how effectively Mr. Finch can treat 
other than pathetic themes ; 



1 66 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

THE STORM KING. ' \ 

I am Storm — the King ! i 

I live in a forest of fire and cloud, J 

You may hear my batteries sharp and loud _ .; 

In the summer night, • ^ 

When I and my warriors ai-m for the fight ; . ' 

And the willows moan, 

And the cedars groan, ' 
And they bend beneath the terrible spring 

Of Storm, the King ! 

I am Storm — the King! < 

My troops are the wind, and the hail, and the rain ; ^ 

My foes are the woods and the feathery grain ; • 

The mail-clad oak 

That gnarls his front to my chaige and stroke ; •: 

The ships on the sea, '] 

The blooms on the lea, — \ 
And they writhe and break as the wai--cries ring 

Of Storm, the King! ^ 

I am Storm — the King! '■ 

I drove the sea o'er the Leyden dykes, ' i 

And a deadlier foe than the burgher pikes ; '• 

To the wall I bore i 

The " Ark of Delft " from the ocean's shore, I 

O'er vale and mead, \ 

"With war-like speed. 
Till Spaniards fled from the deluge ring 

Of Storm, the King ! ^ 

I am Storm — the King" ! 

I saw an armada set sail from Spam, '^ 

To sprinkle with blood a maiden's reign ; ;j 



FRANCIS M. FINCH. id'j 

I met the host 
"With shattering blows on the island coas 

And tore each deck 

To shreds and a wreck ; 
And the Saxon poets the praises sing 

Of Storm, the King ! 

I am Storm — the King ! 
My marshals are four — the swart simoon, 
Sirocco, tornado, and swift typhoon ; 

My realm is the world, 
Wherever a pennon is waved or furled ; 

My stern command 

Sweeps sea and land ; 
And none unharmed a scoff may fling 

At Storm, the King ! 

I am Storm — the King ! 
I scour the earth, the sea, the air, 
And drag the trees by their emerald hair 

A chase for game ; 
"With a leap and a scream, the prairies flame. 

The commerce ark 

And the pirate bark ; 
And none may escape the terrible spring 

Of Storm, the King ! 

As a newspaper poet, in the sense of having been 
widely read and universally appreciated, Mr. Finch stands 
among the few. It is the public's loss that he so persist- 
ently hides his poetic light, as it was the public's gain 
when he yielded once to a better impulse, and gave us 
''The Blue and the Gray." 




MARGARET E. SANGSTER. 



HE whole story of a faithful, long-loving wedded 
life is contained in the following waif, which in 
point of exquisite tenderness, of pathos the more 
pathetic for its complete simplicity, is rarely equalled. 
There is even more in it than the story : it has all the 
homely grace of a picture, which one sees while he reads ; 

ARE THE CHILDREN A T HOME. 

Each day when the glow of sunset 

Fades in the western sky, 
And the wee ones, tired of playing, 

Go tripping lightly by, 
I steal away from my husband, 

Asleep in his easy chair, 
And watch from the open doorway 

Their faces fresh and fair. 

Alone in the dear old homestead 

That once was full of life, 
Ringing with girlish laughter, 

Echoing boyish strife 
We two are waiting together ; 

And oft, as the shadows come, 
With tremulous voice he calls me, 

" It is night ! are the children home?** 



I70 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

" Yes, love ! " I answer him gently, 
" They 're all home long ago ; " 
And I sing with my quivering treble 

A song so soft and low, 
Till the old man drops to slumber, 
"With his head upon his hand, 
And I tell to myself the number 
Home in the Better Land. 

Home, where never a sorrow 

Shall dim their eyes with tears ! 
Where the smile of God is on them 

Through all the summer years ! 
I know ! — yet my arms are empty, 

That fondly folded seven, 
And the mother heart within rne 

Is almost starved for Heaven. 

Sometimes, in the dusk of evening, 

I only shut my eyes, 
And the children are all about me, 

A vision from the skies : 
The babes whose dimpled fingers 

Lost the way to my breast, 
And the beautiful ones, the angels, 

Passed to the world of the blessed. 

With never a cloud upon them, 

I see their radiant brows :_ 
My boys that I gave to freedom, — 

The red sword sealed their vows \ 
In a tangled Southern forest. 

Twin brothers, true and brave. 
They fell ; and the flag they died for, 

Thank God ! floats over their grave ! 



MARGARET E. SANGSTER, l*Jl 

A breath, and the vision is lifted 

Away on the wings of light, 
And again we two are together. 

All alone in the night. 
They tell me his mind is failing, 

But I smile at idle fears ; 
He is only back with the children. 

In the dear and peaceful years. 

And still as the summer sunset 

Fades away in the west, 
And the wee ones, tired of playing. 

Go trooping home to rest, 
My husband calls from his corner, 

" Say, love ! have the children come?" 
And I answer, with eyes uplifted, 
" Yes, dear ! they are all at home ! " 

It were very easy to paint the picture, after reading 
the poem. There stands the cottage by the roadside, 
whence so much of light and love have fled ; the wistful 
face of the mother looks out of the open doorway upon 
the children trooping past ; and through the window you 
catch a glimpse of the bent form, the wrinkled cheeks and 
whitening hair of the dozing old man, to whom life's twi- 
light has indeed come, whose waking thought, as in days 
gone by, is still one of parental care and affection. Two 
lonely waiters ! each in a certain way waiting for the sound 
of voices heard here no longer, for the tramp of little 
feet sounding only in memory — waiting for all the dear 
home joys so rudely broken, so sadly missed, for the som- 



172 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

forts of an old age longing to De comforted, and the 
ripening blessings which the years should surely bring. 
Two lonely waiters ! — is there not such a pair by many a 
hearthstone ? except, mayhap, that neither 

— " is only back with the children 
In the dear and peaceful years," 

and both are waiting in the same patient way to greet the 
absent when God's good time comes. 

**Are the Children at Home?" was written in the 
summer of 1867, on a pleasant verandah in Norfolk, Va., 
overlooking the blue Elizabeth River. It was published 
in The Atlantic Monthly for November of the same year, 
was promptly caught up by the Press, and republished 
everywhere, and during these years since has been read as 
often, perhaps, as any poem in the language. It has 
been frequently recited in public by the Vandenhoffs ; 
and we have heard other readers give it with admirable 
effect. There was nothing noteworthy in the circumstan- 
ces of its composition. It was an inspiration, suggested 
by no incident — one of those fruitful fancies with which 
heaven blesses some people, that thereby othefrs may be 
blessed. The author is Mrs. Margaret E. Sangster, now 
a resident of Williamsburg, New York, and long time a 
contributor to some of the best periodicals. 

Mrs. Sangster has written more or less for publication 
since her fourteenth year. At that early age she took a 
prize for an Essay on Temperance, over about five hun- 



MARGARET E. SANGSTER. 173 

dred competitors, the prize offered being a small collec- 
tion of standard authors, and the essayists such pupils, 
male and female, of the various public and private schools 
in New York and Brooklyn as chose to compete. She 
was then a member of Williamsburg- Collegiate Insti- 
tute a French and English school of considerable reputa- 
tion, and will be pleasantly remembered by many who 
studied there. Mrs. Sangster's contributions have been to 
religious papers, in the main — Presbyterian and Reformed 
Dutch — and to Sunday School literature. Her warm 
heart has always gone out most lovingly towards the chil- 
dren, and they have much to thank her for. Several years 
ago the Boston Tract Society issued a collection of her 
sketches and short articles, under the title of "Heaven 
and Home/' All of Mrs. Sangster's earlier writing was 
over her maiden initials — M. E. M. — behind which she now 
occasionally veils herself She is not a very prolific writer, 
partly, perhaps, because writing is with her a matter of 
mood ; partly because the duties of wife and mother make 
so continual demands upon her time, and she is com- 
pelled to pursue her literary work in what Marion Har- 
land calls "the betweens" — ^yet she has written much, 
both in prose and verse, and has the happy knack of al- 
ways writing well. That she puts more heart into what 
she does than do many, is one secret of her growing pop- 
ularity, due, doubtless, to constitutional temperament. 

Mrs. Sangster is a native of New York State, and has 
lived in it all her liff^ save a few years in Virginia, and one 



174 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

twelve-month during the war, in Maryland. Few ladies 
in the State have as much of the real poetic feeling, and 
none more beautifully, more touchingly express that feeling 
than does she. Nothing further were needed to prove this 
statement than the poem already given. In producing 
other of her verse, we quote first a poem which origi- 
nally appeared in The Christian Union: 

A VESPER SONG. 

The clouds of the sunset, fold on fold, 

Are purple, and tawny, and edged with gold. 

Soft as the silence after a hymn. 

Is the hush that falls, as the light grows dim. 

And the phantom feet of the shadows glide 
To the maple tops and the river's tide. 

Not even the thought of a sound is heard, 
Till the dusk is thrilled by a hidden bird 

That suddenly sings— as the light grows dim — 
Its wonderful passionate vesper hymn. 

Sweet as the voice of an angel's call, 
Sent to me from the jasper wall, 

Is the music poured from that tiny throat, 
A message of comfort in every note, 

I know not where in the leafy tree, 
The dear little warbler's home may be ; 

Nor care I to find, by a thoughtful quest, 
Its cunningly woven castled nest. 



e: 






I 

05 




MARGARET E. SANGSTER 175 

The singer was less to my heart to-night, 

Than the song he dropped through the parting light. 

Its overflow of a joy intense, 
Came unto me, like a recompense 

For the undertone of an aching care, 
That w£^s near to making my soul despair. 

There' are, in this world where God is King 
Some that have nothing to do — but sing ! 

Some that are all too blithe to keep 
Pent in, the voice of their rapture deep. 

Though it may be low under waves of pain, 
They found the pearl of their purest strain. 

And we who listen, have nought to say 
Concerning their Master's rule and way. 

Only this, — it was surely best. 

Since it taught them strains so full of rest. 

And this, that never a folded wing 

Should cover a heart that was meant to sing, 

And show the path to a lighted Ark, 
Perhaps, to some one lost in the dark. 

The hovie impulse, shines through nearly all that Mrs. 
Sangster pens. You see it and feel it in the waif we have 
given, and it is not less recognizable in this Scotch dis- 
guise, which found place first in Harper's Bazar, for 
which excellent journal Mrs. S. writes much, and has 
been repeatedly seen elsewhere : 



176 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

■I HE WELCOME, 

Anither bairn cam hame, 

Hame to mither an' me 1 
It was yestre 'en in the gloamin*. 

When scarce was light to see 
The wee bit face o' the darlin', 

Its greetin' cry was heard, 
An' our crowded nestie made a place 

To hand anither bird. 

Sax little bonnie mouths. 

Ah me ! tak muckle to fill, 
But to grudge the bit to the seventh, 

For mither an' me were ill ; 
Sae nestle up closer, dearie. 

Lie saft on the snawy breist, 
Where fast life's fountain floweth, 

When thy twa warm lips are preist. 

The rich mon counteth his treasures, 

By the shinin' gowd in 's hand. 
By 's ships that sail on the sea, 

By 's harvests that whiten the land ; 
The puir mon counteth his blessings 

By the ring o' voices sweet. 
By the hope that glints in bairnies' een. 

By the sound o' bairnies' feet. 

An' it 's welcome hame my darlin*, 
Hame to mither an' me 

An' it 's never may ye fin' less o' love 
Than the love ye brought wi' ye ! 

Cauld 's the blast o' the wild wind, 
An* rough the world may be, 



MARGARET E. SANGSTER. 177 

But warm 's the hame o' the wee one, 
In the hearts o' mither an' me ! 

This same home thought, but with an application 
all may make their own, is apparent in the following, also 
from The Bazar, which has wandered far as a waif ; 

OUR OWN. 

If I had known in the morning 

How wearily all the day 
The words unkind would trouble my mind 

That I said when you went away, 
I had been more careful, darling, 

Nor given you needless pain ; 
But we vex our own with look and tone 

We may never take back again. 

For though in the quiet evening 

You may give me the kiss of peace, 
Yet it well might be that nerer for me 

The pain of the heart should cease ! 
Ho.w many go forth at morning 

Who never come home at night ! 
And hearts have broken for harsh words spoken, 

That sorrow can ne'er set right. 

We have careful thought for the stranger, 

And smiles for the sometime guest ; 
But oft for our own the bitter tone, 

Though we love our own the best. 
Ah ! lips with the curve impatient, 

Ah ! brow with the shade of scorn, 
'T were a cruel fate, were the night too late 

To undo the work of the morn ! 
13 



178 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Mrs. Sangster knows the true pathos of life — as so 
many sweet singers do — but despite this, she has gone on 
as bravely as a brave woman could, with her chief trust in 
divine help, her chief comfort in divine hope. If some- 
times the clouds were dark about her, she has found them 
growirxg brighter as looked at in imagination from 

THE HE A VEN SIDE. 

The sky was soft with tender blue, 
As Heaven itself was shining through, 
And far above our restless world 
Its bannered peace was wide unfurled. 

The distant mountains' purple line 
Was bathed in splendor all divine. 
And seemed the valley's cup to brim 
With waves of beauty to the rim. 

The very wind was soft and sweet, 
That rocked the grass blades at our feet, 
And gently did the zephyrs blow 
Across the buckwheat's billowy snow ; 

When lo ! a change. The tranquil sky 
Grew dark. Black clouds come drifting by ; 
Like battled hosts in war's array, 
Their vengeful ranks assault the day ! 

And grim and sullen, fold on fold, 
They hide the summer's shining gold. 
Till wood, and field, and wayside path 
Are menaced in their stormy wrath. 

Still o'er them soft the tender blue. 

With Heaven's brightness gleaming through, 



MARGARET E. SANGSTER. 179 

Was steadfast, radiant, undismayed, 
Too lifted up to be afraid. 

And while we shivered in the gray 
Thick falling gloom that wrapped the day, 
Lo ! touched by spears of sunny light, 
The clouds are edged with sparkling white. 

And, looked on from the Heaven side, 
They surely must be glorified. 
And where God sees them floating fair, 
Seem isles of peace in upper air. 

For a year or two, Mrs. S. was employed as Associate 
Editor of Hearth &" Home, and in that capacity she wrote 
much in the way of miscellaneous matter — stories, essays, 
and the like. Several of her poems, contributed to that 
journal, were generally copied, notably this : 

BEFORE THE LEAVES FALL. 

I wonder if oak and maple, 

Willow and elm and all. 
Are stirred at heart by the coming 

Of the day their leaves must fall. 
Do they think of the yellow whirlwind, 

Or know of the crimson spray, 
That shall be when chill November 

Bears all their leaves away? 

Perhaps beside the water 

The willow bends, serene 
As when her young leaves glistened 

In a mist of golden green ; 



l8o WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

But the brave old oak is flushing 

To a wine-red dark and deep, 
And maple and elm are blushing 

The blush of a child asleep. 

" If die we must," the leaflets 
Seem one by one to say, 
" We will wear the colors of gladness 
Until we pass away. 
No eyes shall see us falter ; 

And before we lay it down. 
We '11 wear, in the sight of all the earth, 
The year's most kingly crown." 

So, trees of the stately forest. 

And trees of the trodden way. 
You are kindling into glory 

This soft autumnal day, 
And we who gaze remember 

That more than all they lost. 
To hearts and trees together. 

May come through the ripening frost. 

The following, contributed to Tht Bazar, has become 
a seasonable tit-bit for editors, and is given place in their 
columns almost every recurring spring : 

THE BUILDING OF THE NEST, 

They '11 come again to the apple tree- 
Robin and all the rest — 

When the orchard branches are fair to see 
In the snow of the blossoms dressed. 

And the prettiest thing in the world will be 
The building of the nest. 



MARGARET E. SANG ST ER, i8j 

Weaving it well so round and trim, 

Hollowing it with care, 
Nothing too far away for him, 

Nothing for her too fair ; 
Hanging it safe on the topmost limb — 

Their castle in the air. 

Ah, mother-bird, you '11 have weary days 
When the eggs are under your breast. 

And your mate will fear for willful ways 
When the wee ones leave the nest ; 

But they '11 ilnd their wings in a glad amaze. 
And God will see to the rest. 

So come to the trees with all your train 

When the apple-blossoms blow ; 
Through the April shimmer of sun and rain 

Go flying to and fro ; 
And sing to our hearts as we watch again 

Your fairy building grow. 

A hint of Mrs. Sangster's religious feeling may be 
found in the first two poems reproduced. In this, writ- 
ten for The Independenl, there is exquisite tenderness of 
longing, blent with most beautiful recognition of need : 

WAYFARERS, 

The way is long, my darling. 

The road is rough and steep, 
And fast across the evening sky 

I see the shadows sweep. 
But oh ! my love, my darling, 

No ill to us can come, 
No terror turn us from the path, 

For we are going home, 



l82 WAIFS AND THEI R AUTHORS. 

Your feet are tired, my darling — 

So tired, the tender feet ; 
But think, when we are there at last. 

How sweet the rest ! how sweet ! 
For lo ! the lamps are lighted. 

And yonder gleaming dome, 
Before us, shining like a star, 

Shall guide our footsteps home. 

We 've lost the flowers we gathered 

So early in the morn ; 
And on we go, with empty hands 

And garments soiled and worn. 
But oh ! the dear All-Father 

Will out to meet us come. 
And fairer flowers and whiter robes 

There wait for us at home ! 

Art cold, my love, and famished? 

Art faint and sore athirst? 
Be patient yet a little while, 

And joyous as at first ; 
For oh ! the sun se^s never 

Within that land of bloom, 
And thou shalt eat the bread of life 

And drink life's wine at home. 

The wind blows cold, my darling, 
Adown the mountain steep. 

And thick across the evening sky 
The darkling shadows creep ; 

But oh ! my love, press onward, 
• Whatever trials come. 

For in the way the Father set 
We two are going home. 



MARGARET E. SANGSTER. 183 

That is indeed a blessed wayfaring, which sees only 
the glorious goal ahead. Yet often between the want 
and the wealth, between the hope and the realization, 
there are inevitable weariness and pain, unavoidable grief 
and care ; and mindful of these, as every conscious soul 
must be, we find comfort in philosophy like this : 

SUFFICIENT UNTO THE DA V. 

Because in a day of my days to come 

There waiteth a grief to be, 
Shall my heart grow faint, and my lips be dumb 

In this day that is bright for me ? 

Because of a subtle sense of pain. 

Like a pulse-beat threaded through 
The bliss of my thought, shall I dare refrain 

From delight in the pure and true ? 

In the harvest fields shall I cease to glean 

Since the summer bloom has sped ? 
Shall I veil mine eyes to the noon-day sheen 

Since the dew of the morn hath fled ? 

Nay, phantom ill with the warning hand 

Nay, ghosts of the weary past, 
Serene, as in armor of faith, I stand. 

You may not hold me fast. 

Your shadows across my sun may fall, 

But as bright the sun shall shine. 
For I walk in a light ye cannot pall. 

The light of the King Divine. 
And whatever the shades from day to day, 

I am sure that His name is Love, 



1 84 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

And He never will let me lose my way 
To my rest in His home above. 

When Alice Gary died, Mrs. Sangster mourned her 
as only one sweet singer can really mourn another, and 
sang this tender requiem in The Independent : 

ALICE CARY. 

Ah ! Spring will bi'ing us back the birds 

And we shall hear their singing, 
From flickering shade of leaf and bough, 

Its wildwood sweetness flinging ! 
And warp of sun and woof of rain 

Shall cross the flying hours, 
Till dimpling vale and climbing hill 

Are broidered fair with flowers ! 

But ever through the April mists, 

And through the Maytime splendor, 
We '11 miss the music of her voice, 

So passion-thrilled and tender. 
We '11 weary when the days are long, 

And o'er our life-task linger. 
And by how much we miss the song 

Our hearts shall mourn the singer ! 

The saintly patience of thy life, 

O lovely one departed ! 
Hath cheered the fainting in the strife, 

Hath helped the heavy-hearted ; 
Thy words went forth like carrier doves, • 

On swift white wings of blessing. 
All fearless to rebuke the wrong, 

All loyal faith confessing. 




;, \v 



;W 



I iiiiiiiiiiniw 



MARGARET E. SANGSTER, 185 

In solemn shadow of the pines, 

Where prairie winds are sweeping, 

It shall be said of thee to-day, 
** She. is not dead, but sleeping .' " 

The while that tears are falling fast, 
The light of heaven breaking 

Across the memory of thy past 
Shall prophesy thy waking. 

O, love ! our homes are reft in thee 

By every tender token ! 
A household word, thy gentle name 

Where households meet, is spoken ; 
And when our Father gathers all 

His children dear together, 
We '11 bless thee, when we meet at home, 

For thou hast helped us hither I 

When Margaret E. Sangster dies the world will 
mourn a singer not less sweet and cheer-giving than 
Miss Gary, and if the time comes not too soon, not less 
known. May Heaven hold the day far distant ; and mean- 
while may we be often touched to deeper tenderness and 
purer life by the songs she shall sing ! 





SIMEON TUCKER CLARK, 

HE amateur poet belongs to no class. He, or 
she, may be almost anything else, plus a poet. 
Poetry is in the man, or in the woman, and is not 
necessarily part of an individual's calling. Happy indeed 
are they, however, who find somewhat of poetic grace in 
all their work, and who catch some poetic impulse from 
the dullest duty they perform. These are the true poets, 
whom God has royally endowed ; they are rich in their 
divine gift of joy, albeit toilers among the poor. 

This volume justifies our declaration concerning am- 
ateur poets. It treats among others of a professional con- 
cert singer, a political editor, a public lecturer, a financial 
officer of the Government, a country journalist, a mer- 
chant's^ clerk, a school teacher and a lawyer ; as also of 
a young girl but lately out of school, a young wife with 
wedded happiness just begun, a widow mourning her 
lost companior, a young moth r rejoicing over her babes, 
another ever remembering those she has lost, a gray-haired 
matron proud of her grown up youth. These, with others, 
prove that poetic feeling will exist in any walk of life, and 
that poetic expression is heard amid most diverse sur 
Foundings and under conditions the most unlike 



1 88 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

We are now about to speak of one whose divine sense 
breathes out amid the exacting calls of medical practice, 
who weds the gift of healing to the gift of song, — -Dr. S. 
T. Clark, of Lockport, N. Y. He has written much — 
more than almost any other Newspaper Poet we have — 
and his productions have appeared in some of our best 
periodicals. A delicate spring time fancy, published first 
in The Aldine when under editorship of R. H. Stoddard, 
has been many times reprinted. It is entitled 

COMING AND GOING. 

Winds, to-day, from yonder lilacs, blowing through my open 

door, 
Bore their fragrance to a baby who had never breathed before. 

But the dear old man who knew them, just as fresh and pu r- 

ple then, 
Seventy years ago, as now, will nevei% never breathe again ! 

One was going up to heaven as the other came to earth ; 
And the mortals and immortals each made record of a birth ; 

As two souls upon the boundary which divides that world from 

this, 
Met and parted, in the melting of a first and last fond kiss ! 

With a weary wail of welcome saw the little child the day ! 
With a song of praise triumphant passed the patriarch away ' 

All the same — the cradled cherub or the pulseless, coffined 

clod — 
^ife and death alike are angels and the messengers of God 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK, 189 

It gives a clue to Dr. Clark's mental characteristics, 
as also to his temperament. He is thoughtful, earnest, 
religious. Suggestions are very fruitful with him ; he 
catches them on the wing, and turns them quickly to his 
behoof. He is tender of sentiment, lavish of sympathy, 
rich in reflection, overflowing with love. 

Simeon Tucker Clark was born in Canton, Norfolk 
county, Mass., October loth, 1836, his father being Rev. 
Nathan Sears Clark, a IMethodist clergyman. His mother, 
formerly Laura S. Swift, composed with great facility in 
verse, often writing acrostics, elegies, rhymed epistles, and 
sometimes contributing to The Boston Oliv2 Branch, 
and the True Odd Fellow. Her son, as he once assured 
us, began to rhyme before he could write, and has never 
stopped. 

He betrayed the true literary bent, in early bovhood. 
One of his teachers says of him : — ''I knew him as a 
school-boy, a child of the true poetic organization, gentle 
and brave, but morbidly sensitive to praise or reproof. To 
a girlish admiration of flowers was added a naturalist's 
knowledge of them ; in fact, at the early age of sixteen all 
the delights of natural science were open to him. At 
this time I remember of remarking to another of his 
teachers that although my life had been spent in the soci- 
ety of children of culture, I had never, nor have I ever, 
seen a youth whose reading had been so extensive or so 
critical. " His school compositions were usually in verse, 



1 90 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



the same authority informs us ; and to this fact, as also to 
a fine musical ear, well cultured, we must attribute the 
uncommon perfection of his rhythm now. Indeed, his 
earliest published efforts were marked by peculiar sweet- 
ness of melody. Mere melodiousness does not make 
poetry, but poetry without music in it is like a half-life 
without its complement. Upon its own wings of song 
should poetry fly, and flying thus, it will fly far, — from 
heart to heart, from home to home, from clime to clime. 
The music of a thought has often won it immortality. 
Not many regrets have found expression in such sweet 
grace of rhythm and rhyme as is manifest in this, written 
several years ago, and of frequent appearance as a waif: 

GERALDINE. 

Has any one seen 
My lost Geraldine ? 
My beautiful, dutiful, dear Geraldine ! 
Has she been this way 
In the course of the day ? 

Tell me truly, ye swains . 

You would know Geraldine, 
My idolized queen. 
By the glimmering, shimmering, silvery sheen 
Of her curling hair 
As it floats on the air 

In the glamouring light 

I sought Geraldine 
In the meadows green, 
"Where the rarest, the fairest of flowers were seen : 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK, 191 

But a stranger was there, 
Surpassingly fair, 

That filled me with woe. 

For never before 
On mountain or moor, 
Such a heavenly-hued, pearl-bedewed flower I am sure 
Ever raised its fair form 
To the sunshine or storm ; 
But it could not be mine. 

For a wild honey bee 
From over the sea. 
Thence coming, loud humming, unmindful of me, 
For his holiday treat 
Sipped the nectaral sweet 

That should have been mine. 

Then an oriole came 
With its bosom of flame, 
And so dearly, sincerely, it warbled her name — 
I gladly had pressed 
The bright bird to my breast, 
When it flew from my sight. 

I have sought Geraldine 
In all places, I ween — 
In the night, where the white marble monuments gleam 
'Neath the yew's solemn shade, 
To tell where is laid 
A handful of dust ! 

And I found not my bride, 
But a grave for my pride, 
For each mound that I found had a mound by its side ; 
And if I were to die 



192 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

I could not even lie 

By my Geraldine's side. 

Alas ! none have seen 
This lost Geraldine— 
Unreal, ideal, serene Geraldine ! 

Long, long is the day 
Ere she passes this way ! 
Farewell to ye swains ! 

Choosing the profession of medicine, and duly 
awarded the degree of M. D. by Berkshire Medical 
College in i860, supplemented by the honorarium of 
A. M. from Genesee College since. Dr. Clark gave him- 
self up to it with all that zeal and enthusiasm so striking 
in his nature, and is now one of the leading physicians 
in the City of Locks. With him, poetry has been no sen- 
timental diversion from daily duties. It has been but a 
constant pleasure, we may say, in the very midst of duty. 
It has helped to keep his heart warm and his soul sensi- 
tive ; it has taught him what it is ever ready to teach 
those in communion with it — the sweetness and charm 
of liie, the hidden meaning of life's varied forms, the 
silent speech of marble statue and of silver wave. Hence, 

PERDITA. 

Her fair vounsr arms embrace the cross 
On which the Prince of Glory diedj 

The star of faith beams on her brow, 
The anchor — Hope — is by her side ; 

Her parting lips are moved in prayer, 
Her falling tears are not of woe , 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK 193 

For in communion with her Lord, 
She finds her heaven begun below. 

Oh ! better never earthly love 

Had robbed the cross of such a saint ; 
That faith should dim and hope decline, 

Or prayer be changed to sad complaint. 
Her arms embrace — but not the cross ; 

Her lips are ripe— but not with prayer ; 
She holds communion with her Lox-d — 

But Love is lord and master there ! 

How still and cold the marble lies ! 

"What sculptor wrought that statue grand. 
So beautiful, so like divine ? 

No workman of unskillful hand ; 
In every clime, his art was learned ; 

And all the world has owned his fame ; 
For God Himself his master was, 

A.nd Death the grand old master's name. 

This was originally contributed to Appleions Jour- 
nal, and is admirable, in its way. It has been frequently 
copied. Better even than this, however, is the follov.ung 
apostrophe, which originally appeared in Godeys Maga- 
zine, addressed 

TO THE VENUS OF MILO. 

It matters not whose skill thy form created. 
What hours he sat beside thy tomb alone ; 

Or how he watched and wept, or wrought and waited, 
As grain by grain he rolled away the stone; 

Until, at last, in glorious resurrection 



194 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

His dead dream rose, transformed, no more to die, 
Anointed from the horn of heaven's perfection 
As all our dead dreams shall be by-and-by 1 

His name and clime are lost, but yet right royal 

He stands the peer of any time or man : 
His kingly head and skillful hand in loyal 

Pursuit of truth aspired to nature's plan — 
Created, gave the world thy stony splendor, 

Revealed the beautiful that was to be — 
Compelled the ministry of art to render 

Invisible thought, a visible form in thee. 

Let Pagans call thee Venus or Minerva, 

Diana, Ceres, it is all the same ; 
Or Christians, worshipping in holy fervor, 

Adore thee by the Virgin Mother's name : 
Thou art still more ; in thy Divine Creation 

The light of genius evermore shall beam — 
Thoughts petrified — soul-throbs in preservation — 

The marble memory of a sculptor's dream ! 

As a writer of sonnets Dr. Clark succeeds beyond 
the average. In the following we have three exquisite 
stanzas, which in turn embody a most exquisite idea : 

THREE SONNETS BUT NO SONG. 
Before Singing. 

In vain you ask me, " Shall I sing to-day?" 
I may be tuneless till this time next year ; 
But'if I sing, my song shall feel no fear 
Or sorrow, should you turn in scorn away. 
And shame my simple strain, or smile and say — 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK. 195 

As you have done before with scoff and sneer — 
" The owl and not the nightingale I hear ; " 
For when heaven sends the peace for which I pray 
My soul will soar as borne on eagle's wings, 

And prayer shall lose itself in perfect praise ! 
God will except the offering that I bring 

Though you despise my inharmonious lays. 
So shall I keep my harp-strings tuned and bright ; 
And sing again when God gives me the light ! 

The Interlude. 

! I have been a child of many prayers ! 

My mother — sleeping now beneath the sod, 

Gave me, ere I was born, in prayer to God 
To be His child. Let him declare who dares 
That she, in glory, now no longer cares 

To shield my shoulders from the lifted rod ; 

Or, that the pathway that my feet have trod 
Has not been gleaned by her from gins and snares. 
No hour that I have lived but some sweet word 

From woman's lip has entered heaven for me. 
And, by God's gracious tenderness been heard 

And answered in some blessing full and free. 
The eyes I oftenest caused on earth to weep, 
In heaven, for me, their ceaseless vigils keep ! 

After Singing. 

Great Son of God ! O Jesus — brother mine — 
My song has come and gone, and not a word 
By other eye or ear was seen or heard ! 

1 could not write or sing Thy love divine, 
I only felt it. and the outward sign 

Was love to all things that the Godhead stirred 



196 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

To life and being — seraph, man, beast, bird — 
I loved all perfectly, for all were Thine ! 
And the strange music in my soul was sweet ! 

Men only heard the echo, that was fi-ee, 
But the grand harmony was only meet 

For me to hear, and only once for me ! 
Farewell, remembered song ! In heaven above 
The angels call thee — Universal Love ! 

We will quote but one other sonnet, suggested by 
the last words of Henry Timrod, South Carolina's poet ; 

" LOVE IS SWEETER THAN REST. " 

Life brings no burden to be borne so great, 
Heaven has no rest so sweet to offer me 
That I would seek repose, if it must be 

Without thy love, and from thee separate. 

For "love is sweeter than rest," and that estate 
Is mine in thee. The fruic of every tree 
May turn to ashes in my mouth ; the sea 

May drown my nrgosies with all their freight : 

The winds may scatter in their wanton glee 
The gatherings of my early toil and late : 

Or flame, or pestilence leave only thee ; 
I still will bear all burdens, glad to wait 

And work with thee, nor ever sigh to see 

Lethean rest from love's sweet service free ! 

The unity of this, and the simplicity of its rhyme, 
are peculiar. We have really but two rhyming words in 
the fourteen lines — ''great," in the first line, has five 
words that rhyme with it; and ''me,' in the second 
line, has seven rhyming in turn with that. 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK. 197 

Perhaps the following, wcitten for the Buffalo 
Courier, illustrates Dr. Clark's felicity of thought, and 
tenderness of feeling, as well as anything we have now at 
hand. 

SYMPA THY. 

His kindly kisses, tremulous and tender, 

Falling like blessings on my brow and cheek. 
Filled all my soul with such supernal splendor, 

As my dumb lips could never frame to speak ; 
Nave, aisle and chancel of my heart were lighted ; 

The altar, once a-cold, was all aflame, 
And where I strayed and prayed, a nun benighted. 

Bright, light and plain the path of life became. 

His words of sympathy, like sweet bells ringing. 

Called every angel in my breast to prayer ; 
And Hope, the surpliced priest, his censer swinging, 

"With friendship's incense, sweetened every care ; 
Now all about me, in their graves are sleeping 

Forgotten fears, born in my darker days, 
And where they moulder, I am ever reaping 

The golden grain of gratitude and praise. 

And for such fruit, I breathe a benediction 

On him the lord of all my earthly love, 
For only shall the day of crucifixion, 

Upon my calendar be placed above 
That day of days, when, from his higher station 

He reached with helping hand and pitying eye, 
And looked upon and touched, in tribulation, 

A starving soul, the world had doomed to die. 



ipS WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

It is certainly very graceful, very sympathetic, very 
pure and very sweet. And this, written also for the 
Courier, will bear re-reading many times, and will seem 
to gain in rhythmic charm and loving remembrance with 
each repetition : 

GOLDEN ROD. 

It would please me well, could my iailor tell 
The home and the name of the child who came 

With flowers to my cell ! 
Such flowers as wave on my mother's grave 

In a woodland dell ! 

For the maid was fair ; 
And her nut-brown hair and saintly air 

Were a sight divine ; 
But human art never pierced a heart 

As she pierced mine 

With a scepter grand — 
With the graceful nod of a Golden-rod 

In her dimpled hand — 
A simple spire with a crown of fire 
That burns and glows when the south wind blows 

O'er the fragrant land ! 

Long years gone by my mother and I 
Like groom and bride rode side by side 

With such untold love, 
That the Blessed Three alone could be 

More blest than we 

In the courts above ! 
I remember the day, and the bright birds' play, 

And their carols gay ; 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK. ' 199 

My mother's face and her words of grace ; 

The fountain's spray ; 
The ringinsf roar from the singing shore 
Of a swollen stream o'er a rocky floor ; 
The threatened shower at the noon-tide hour ; 

The mountains gray ; 
And the rose red tips of those white winged ships 
That sail away with the purple day 

Into sun-set bay ; 
Churches and towers and hosts of flowers — 
Like troops of angels the beautiful hours 

Encamped around ! 
And, in accents mild, she said — " My child 

This is holy ground ! 
Though in garden, hedge, and on lofty ledge, 
And in sylvan bowers I see fresh flowers 

With the fronds at rest, 
Still the Golden-rod of the road-side clod 

Is of all, the best ! 
In Its golden sheen I have always seen 
The scepter, touched by the Persian Queen 

Who had favor gained ; 
And this flower shall be henceforth to thee 
A visible sign of God's love and mine — 

A love unfeigned ! " 

So passed the hours. 
The very next day I sailed away ! 
The ship has never returned they say ; 

And a dark cloud lowers ! 

From land to sea, 
Since those glad days, through devious ways 

My feet have trod ; 
And at last I fell in this felon's cell, 



2 oo WA IFS A ND THEIR A U THOR S. \ 

Where the sweet child came in her dear Lord's name, 1 

And a Golden-rod as the scepter of God < 

Held out to me ! ' \ 

And I prayed once more as I prayed before \ 

My mother died ; 

And the prayers and tears of her three-score years 1 

Are satisfied ! 1 

Dr. Clark's fancy is often bold, even to the astonish- ■ 

ing of him who reads. The followine- Doem is so daring \ 

in conception, albeit so daintily short, that one must \ 

peruse it more than once to get a full sense of its real ,| 

merit. The fancy which begat it may have been morbid, 1 

but it was not weak : i 

SWEET DEATH. \ 

He is a stranger to suprernest pleasure ] 

"Who does not covet Death, or is afraid a 

To listen to the low, melodious measure i 

Sung by that siren, when her court is paid ! J 

Who deems the numbness that her touch is giving, | 

Alike to agony, akin to pain? ' 

Not he who knows the mystery of living — '% 

The whirlpool-heart, the fiery furnace brain ! 1 

I lie alone, upon no bed of roses ! 

Sleep does not close my weary watching eyes ; '| 

For just beside me, on her couch, reposes ^ 

Death — my coy love — but Life between us lies ! \ 

Come to my arms, thou chaste and charming maiden ! -\ 

Ki.- s me, until my lips are cold as thine ! i 

Smooth down these eyelids with such sorrow laden ; 5 

And closely press thine icy breast to mine. - 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK. 20 1 

Aye, taunt awhile, and still awhile deride me ; 

And pout thy lips, and turn thy head aside ! 
One hope remains that cannot be denied me — 

When I am dead, Death, thou wilt be my bride ' 

A member of the Masonic order, Dr. Clark has 
written a number of poems with special reference there- 
to, and one of thes^, ''Iscariot," has journeyed far, 
having achieved for its author a transatlantic reputation. 

The religious side of Dr. Clark's nature is very 
marked. As a poet he has found widest recognition 
through his devotional pieces, some of which have been 
reproduced in collections of religious verse, ana have 
thus obtained a permanent place among their kind. 

" Teneo et Teneor" — I hold and I am held — and 
"The Thorn and Cross," both originally written for 
Tht Ru7'al Home, have found worthy position in popu- 
lar volumes, the one in ''The Changed Cross," and the 
other in a later collection, "The Chamber of Peace." 
We quote the latter : 

THE THORN AND THE CROSS. 

" There was given unto me a thorn in the flesh. "— 2 Cor. 
xii. 7. 

" And whosoever doth not bear his cross' and come after me, 
cannot be my disciple. ' —St. Luke xiv. 27. 

The thorn is very sharp, oh ! righteous Master ; 

T^Te flesh is weak ,* 
And drops of blood and blindmg tears fall faster 

Than I can speak ! 



202 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Ah ! deeply in my bosom it is driven 

To rend and tear, 
Pressed by the rugged cross that thou hast given 

For us to bear ! 

I could endure the thorn, though fiercely galling, 

If that were all ; 
Or bear the cross without a fear of falling — 

Yea, count it small 
If I could only bear it on my shoulder, 

And not my breast, 
"Where goads the thorn ; my heart would then grow bolder, 

Blest with such rest. 

I had borne either, singly ; both united 

Have vanquished me ! 
I prostrate lie, oppressed, distressed, benighted, 

And cry to Thee ! 
O, Jesus, place Thy hand beneath the burden 

A little while ; 
Or soothe the wounds by that all -healing guerdon, 

A Saviour's smile ! 

He comes — He lifts — He soothes. A little longer 

I plod my way 
His gracious strength has made my sad soul stronger 

To last the day. 
But cross and thorn will tempt, until the closing 

Of mortal life ; 
And I shall show, although in heaven reposing, 

The scars of strife, 

One or two of the poems previously given, show 
this religious spirit very plainly, We will reproduce one 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK, 203 

more, in illustration, and one of Dr. Clark's simplest 
and most practical bits of verse : 

TOWARD EM 31 A us. 
St. Luke, Chap, xxiv, 33. 

"A journeying to Emmaus ; 
The grandest man of men with us — 
The Christ of God was then with us, 

As we went down to Emmaus. 
How burned our hearts upon the way 
At every word we heard Him say ! 
We never may forget the day 

We journeyed down to Emmaus !'* 

Oh ! blest disciples — chosen two — 
How gladly had we walked with you 
Andaalked of Him, who talked with you 

As you went down to Emmaus ! 
Have touched the hand, and found it warm. 
That raised the dead and stilled the storm ; 
Have worshiped God in human form 

As He walked down to Emmaus ! 

But Jesus walks and talks with men 

As perfectly to-day, as then, 

And hearts burn now, as yours burned when 

You walked with Christ to Emmaus I 
In starless night or sunless day, 
Whoever walks life's weary way 
Forgetting not to watch and pray, 

Is journeying to Emmaus. 

Since poets began to sing, they have sung of the 
sea. From earliest time old ocean has been to them a 



204 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

meditation and a mystery, a picture and a plaint. Cole- 
ridge rhymed in wild, weird way of ' ' The Ancient Mari- 
ner ;" Byron sounded the majestic deep with round, 
majestic lines. Yet none but Dr. Clark has told us 
fittingly 

WHY THE SEA COMPLAINS. 

Early in boyhood the sighing and sobbing 

Sound of the sea-wave was oft in my ears, 
Drowning the voice of my crying, and robbing 

Sleep from young eyes growing pale from their tears. 
Down by the shore when the morning was breaking 

Often I questioned and pitied the sea ; 
And the great deep, from its sad sorrow waking, 

One day grew calm, and made answer to me. 

That was the time of his tender confession ; 

That was the hour when his secret was told ; 
Just as the sun and his royal procession 

Marched up the east with their banners of gold ; 
Just as a rivulet, loving, elated, 

Paused for a moment, for strength, ere she sprang 
Into the arms of Old Ocean, who waited 

To answer the questioning song that I sang. 

Ocean, give ear to the musical waters 

Sliding down hill-side and gliding through lea — 

The bright little brooklet that saucily scatters 
Sparkling, pure drops, as in prodigal glee 

And in trustful profusion, she pours out for thee 

Her life's blood I Now what wilt thou give her ? O sea \ 

" I will give her my all — my heart and my treasure — 
And cherish her ever with tenderest care ; 



SIMEON TUCKER CLARK. 205 

She may float on my bosom and lie at her leisure 

In these briny arms ! but the sun will not spare 
One so lovely and fair : Some sweet summer day- 
He will dazzle and charm her and steal her away ! 

"All my life long I am mourning in sorrow ; 
Longing for loves he has taken from me ; 
Only the hope of some swift coming morrow 

Calms the sad soul of the sullen, salt sea — 
When brooklet and dew-drop and soft summer rain 
May bring to my bosom my darlings again." 

Ocean, like thee, mortals mourn over losses — 

Pleasures long perished while sorrows remain ; 
Here are no shoulders unburdened by crosses, 

Eyelids untear-stained or hearts without pain ! 
But when the angel calls all souls before Him 

Who is the brightness and glory of Heaven, 
Then shall we know as we bow and adore Him, 

All things are sure to the spirit forgiven ! 

We have quoted somewhat freely from Dr. Clark's 
writings, though not as largely as we should like to do. 
But having partially succeeded in illustrating his varied 
lines of thought, and showing his range of style, we 
must stay our hand. 

Dr. Clark has 'written no long poem since he first 
put forth " Josephine" — a youthful venture he has quite 
outgrown — save a dramatic effort for lyceum reading, 
which we have heard well spoken of. The public has a 
right to expect something elaborate from the maturity of 
his powers. As Prof Small remarked of him : **With a 



2o6 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

weird imagination that reminds one of Hawthorne and 
Foe, he unites the chastity of Longfellow and the devo- 
tion of Heber, but he is like neither of them, and be- 
longs to no school. He is not Byronic, Tennysanian, 
or Swinburnish. He leaves his own mark on every poem 
he writes." 

In personal address Dr. Clark is one of few, adding 
the culture of the man of letters to the suavity and ease 
of a man of the world. He is a genial companion, an 
ardent friend, a zealous defender of the weak and a sin- 
cere hater of shams. With a warm, woman-like temper- 
ament, his affections flow out generously towards those 
whose natures are congenial with his own, and such find 
in him unswerving loyalty of heart and unhesitating 
largess of sympathy. And so, as a friend of real literary 
art, he can never be disloyal to it, or at discord therewith. 





KATE B. W. BARNES. 

MONG the many nommes de plume familiar to 
newspaper readers, few are so pleasantly known 
as one always associated with pure sentiment 
and tender reflectiveness — one which, perhaps for this 
very reason, is loved where Sabbath-school songs are sung 
— "Kate Cameron." Indeed, thousands will be sur- 
prised to learn that this is not a genuine cognomen, so 
natural does it sound, so long has it appeared in print. 
The legions of little singers who have sung ' ' Marching 
Along," recognize it, we presume, as the real name of 
their good friend who penned that popular hymn, and 
may not care to be told that she bore another. Yet such 
is the fact ; and that other, often on the lips of apprecia- 
tive acquaintances, in Rochester and elsewhere, was Mrs. 
K. B. W. Barnes. They called her ' ' Kitty, " on the day of 
her birth, and though christened JMaria Burbank Wil- 
liams, in good time, the pet name clung to her, and quite 
superseded the one which was rightfully hers, so that she 
was Kittie Williams, until her marriage day. 

Mrs. Barnes was born in Deerfield, Massachusetts, 
May 24th, 1836, and love of poetry was born in her. An 
inveterate reader at an early age, she did not begin to 
transcribe her own thoughts until nearly twelve years old, 



2oS WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS 

but after that her school-p:irl effusions were numerous, 
for in ' ' compositions " and correspondence she dehghted. 
When seventeen her first printed effort appeared in The 
Springfield Republican, over the signature of "Viola." 
Soon afterward she assumed the nwime de plume we have 
mentioned, and wrote occasionally for various papers, until 
coming to Rochester in 1856, as the wife of Dr. Norman S. 
Barnes. Then her natural inclination was more regularly 
indulged, and her pen found quite constant employment. 
She wrote many stories and poems for Moore s Rural New- 
Yorker, and for fifteen months edited the Tournal of the 
Home, which necessitated much writing. 

In July, i860, she first contributed to the columns of 
the Advocate and Guardian, the organ of the New York 
Home for the Friendless. One of her early poems 
in that periodical began : 

Oh ! save the little children 

Of poverty and crime, 
Whose bitter wail is sounding 

Through the dim aisles of Time. 

Ye may not cleanse the torrent, 
Whose course is strong and sure, 

But, ah ! it needeth little skill 
To make the fountain pure ! 

It caught the attention of William B. Bradbury, 
who married it to music, and who thereafter employed 
Mrs. Barnes' pen often, until his death, in the production 
of hymns for his Sabbath-school singing books. Some 



KATE B. W. BARNES. 



209 



these have been sung in almost every Sabbath-school in 
the land. ''Marching Along, " perhaps led the van in 
popularity, but "We 're nearer Home," ''The Golden 
City," "The Shining Hills of Glory, " and others, are 
hardly less known. After I\Ir. Bradbury's death and until 
ner own, which occurred on the 19th of May, 1873, Mrs. 
Barnes wrote for several other musical composers, havmg 
a happy talent for combining correct rhythm and attrac- 
tive sentiment which is prized by all who, as good com- 
posers ever do, deem these essential to a song's success. 

It is only at rare intervals that a composer is also a 
poet. Moore could sing his own songs ; so, also, can 
and does James G. Clark. There are a few other isolated 
instances of this kind ; but, as a general rule, the com- 
poser procures his text from inspiration outside his own. 
Dr. Thomas Hastings — dear old man ! to whom the 
years were kind because he sang so sweetly — used to pen 
a hymn occasionally ; and his few hymns were like his 
many melodies, tender and uplifting, and only made us 
Mdsh he would write more. Lowell Mason, we believe, 
never attempted hymn composition. Bradbury rarely 
attempted it, seeming content with the service of others, 
where he could have done uniformly well himself 
Woodbury — a sweet singer too early silenced by disease 
and death — left but a few efforts at verse-making. Geo.- 
F. Root has written more, perhaps, than any other com- 
poser, and yet he oftener depends upon others fc^r words 
to match his melody, than upon his own poetic impulses. 

14 



2IO WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Composers catch eagerly at such a gift at song- 
writing as Mrs. Barnes possessed, and appreciate it more 
than people in general possibly can. It may never have 
occurred to most readers, yet it is nevertheless a fact, 
that out of the multitude of poems constantly appear- 
ing, only now and then one is adapted to music. The 
mass lack a nameless grace of thought and expression 
which would make them melody's congenial companion ; 
or, possessing that, in some degree, want the applica- 
tion, the point, which is essential to the popular song. 
Very few, indeed, are the verse-makers whom a composer 
can safely commission to furnish text — who have a prac- 
tical idea of what is requisite in a hymn or a song. Yet 
a large proportion of the Sabbath-school hymns and 
songs are written on commission, and it follows logically 
that the writers thereof can be numbered with your ten 
digits. 

Sabbath-school hymnology is not the embodiment of 
superlative poetic art, we admit, but it compares favor- 
ably with hymnology in general. The best efforts by 
Mrs. Barnes, however, were outside this particular line — 
they filled niches in newspapers, and made friends 
through their own singing alone. One of this class — 
and the very poorest, except in its philosophy — is the 
following, which originally appeared in the Rural New- 
Yorker, perhaps six years ago, and which now-a-days 
smiles out at us from every other paper we pick up : 



KATE B. W, BARNES. 2'i i 

SMILE WHEN'ER YOV CAN, 

When things do n't go to suit you, 

And the world seems upside down, ^ 
Do n't waste your time in fretting, 

But drive away that frown ; 
Since life is oft perplexing, 

'T is much the wisest plan, 
To bear all trials bravely, 

And smile when 'er you can. 

Why should you dread to-morrow, 

And thus despoil to-day ? 
For when you borrow trouble, 

You always have to pay. 
It is a good old maxim, 

Which should be often preacheu ; 
r)o n't cross the bridge before you. 

Until the bridge is reached. 

You might be spared much sighing, 

If you would keep in mind 
The thought that good and evil 

Are always here combined ; 
There must be something wanting, 

And though you roll in wealth, 
You may miss from your casket 

That precious jewel — health. 

And though you, re strong and sturdy, 

You may have an empty purse ; 
(And earth has many trials. 

Which I consider worse ! ) 
But whether joy or sorrow 

Fill up your mortal span, 



2 1 2 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

'Twill malce your pathway brighter 
To smile when 'er you can. 

We commend this philosophy to all terribly sober 
individuals, and feel like thanking our editorial brethren 
for giving it such wide-spread endorsement. In this 
instance, Mrs. Barnes preached, poetically, no more 
than she practiced in the every-day prose of life. Sorrow 
came to her, as it comes to all, but in the midst of all her 
sorrowings and perplexities, this same sunny philosophy 
held its place in her heart. She bore trials bravely, her 
strong, sweet faith in God upholding her even in the 
darkest hour. To those at all familiar with Kate 
Cameron's writings, it is not necessary for us to say that 
hers was the Christian's faith — a faith that can wait God's 
time in patience. It is clearly shown in this little poem, 
which first appeared in the Advocate and Guardian: 

PATIENT WAITING. 

'T was the gain of patient waiting 

That was wafted to my ears, 
In a song sublime and distant 

As the music of the spheres; 
And I saw — as in a vision — 

All that vast rvnd solemn throng 
Linked by common loss and sorrow 

And by suffering made strong ! 

Lips that speak not of their anguish. 
But still smile serene and calm • 
Hands that when they drop the burden, 



KA TE B. W. BARNES. 213 

Henceforth grasp a martyr's palm ; 
Feet that shrink not from the pathway 

Though so thorny to their tread ; 
Hearts that bravely meet the conflict 

Though their earthly hopes have fled. 

And o'er all the anthem floated — 

"Patient waiting is no loss !" 
And it seemed to cast a halo 

O'er each dark and heavy cross ; 
And methought there came an answer 
To each question that perplexed : 
" Ye shall know it all hereafter, 

Not in this world — but the next. " 

Then I traced the mystic letters 

Carved upon life's iron gate, 
At whose stern command we murmur 

When we find there written, Wait ! 
*T is alone the patient waiters 

Who the blessing will receive : 
They who through all doubt and trial, 

Calmly, trustingly, believe ! 

Among the most earnest of Mrs. Barnes' purely re- 
ligious pieces is this, which was written for the Advocate 
and Guardian, and has been copied anonymously by 
several leading journals: 

THE UNPROFITABLE SERVANT. 

In a napkin smooth and white, 
Hidden from all mortal sight, 
My one talent lies to-night. 



214 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

Mine to hoard, or mine to use, 
Mine to keep, or mine to lose, 
May I not do what I choose ? 

Ah ! the gift was only lent. 
With the Giver's known intent 
That it should be wisely spent. 

And I know He will demand 
Every farthing at my hand. 
When I in His presence stand. 

What will be my grief and shame 
When I hear my humble name, 
And can not repay His claim ! 

One poor talent — nothing more ! 
All the years that have gone o'er 
Have not added to the store. 

Some will double what they hold, 

Others add to it ten -fold 

And pay back the shining gold. 

Would that I had toiled like them ! 
All my sloth I now condemn : 
Guilty fears my soul o'erwhelm. 

Lord, O teach me what to do, 
Make me faithful, make me true, 
And the sacred trust renew ! 

Help me, ere too late it be. 
Something yet to do for Thee, 
Thou who hast done all for me^ ! 




■ Down the dim vista of the vanished years 

I gaze, sad-hearted, 
And see through gath'ring mists of blinding tears 

Lo\ed ones departed." Page 215. 



KATE B. W. BARNES. 215 

The Congregationalism has given place to many tender 
things, but to few more tender than the following, which 
affords a glimpse of Mrs. Barnes' inner life. Every be- 
reaved mother will read it with sympathetic interest when 
informed that the allusion in the fifth stanza is to four 
little ones who went from the poet's arms to angelic keep- 
ing : 

THE DEPARTED. 

Down the dim vista of the vanished years 

I gaze sad-hearted, 
And see through gath'ring mists of blinding tears. 

Loved ones departed. 

Brows on which mem'ry's radiance is cast 

In fadeless splendor, 
And voices that still whisper of the past 

In accents tender 

Hands that have lain confidingly in mine, 

As loth to sever ; 
Eyes that upon my darkened pathway shine 

No more, forever ; 

Hearts on which mine was ever wont to lean 

With trust unshaken, 
While not a single cloud could float between, 

Doubt to awaken. 

And dearer than all others to my sight, 

Sweet childish graces ; 
How dark the world grew when death's solemn night 

Hid those fair faces ! 



2i6 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

I sometimes wonder I can ever smile 

Or speak with gladness ; 
But God is good, and present joys beguile 

The past of sadness, 

And the fair future stretches far away 

From our weak vision, 
And thinking of its sunny days, I stray 

In fields Elysian. 

Yet earthly futures are but dark and dim 

Beside that Heaven 
To which God hath, to all that follow Him, 

Free entrance given. 

And there I know my loved ones are at rest, 

'Mid beauty vernal. 
And ne'er can sorrow, care, or sin molest 

Their peace eternal. 

And I will wipe away my selfish tears : 

Death cannot sever 
The ties that bind our souls through mortal years — 

They last forever ! 

In catching '' the tender grace of a day that is dead," 
Kate Cameron was always fortunate. She dwelt linger- 
ingly upon the by-gones. Hf^r past never ceased to be a 
part of her present ; she recalled its pleasures, possibly 
even its pains, with a kind of loving regret which never 
altogether faded out, but which she held to tenderly 
through the years ; and this is how she came to make a 
little medley of memory, about 



KATE B, W. BARNES. 217 

OLD FASHIONED SONGS. 

Her fingers swept across the keys, 

And swift as birds they flew ; 
The music floated on the breeze, 
Our heart went with it, too. 

We heard again the simple lays, 

Each sweet, familiar tune 
That won our ardent love and praise 

When life was in its June. 

Once more we saw on flower and tree. 

The morning sunlight shine ; 
Our hearts were joyous, blithe and free, 

In days of " Auld Lang Syne. " 

And while we shed a silent tear 

For happy hours gone by, 
We met a friend, so true and dear. 

Still " Coming thro' the Rye. " 

That vanished dream was in our thought, 

We breathed a once loved name , 
When with a tender sadness fraught 
"Last Rose of Summer ' came. 

And then we found the refuge blest 

Of hearts that widely roam. 
And owned the dearest and the best 

Of all, was " Home, Sweet Home !" 

But if wont to live over again those happy seasons 
fled, Mrs. Barnes did not repine. She used each present 
day earnestly, hopefully, and looked cheerfully forward to 



2i8 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

THE TIME TO COME. 

This is earth's weary waiting time, 

The world is full of sorrow ; 
But soon within a cloudless clime 

Will dawn a brighter morrow ; 
For that we watch, for that we wait, 

It is the same old story : 
And some time through the Future's gate 

Will come the promised glory. 

Not ours, perchance, the bliss of those 

Who greet its full appearing, 
Yet still triumphant o'er our foes 

We know that it is nearing ; 
When tiuth and right shall grandly rise 

And yield to no oppressing ; 
And on all hearts the open skies 

Shall shower their richest blessing. 

But while we look with eager trust 

For every welcome token. 
It may not come till " Dust to dust" 

Has o'er our graves been spoken. 
We helped the precious seed to sow. 

We bore it forth with weeping ; 
Not ours the harvest joy to know, 

Not ours the golden reaping. 

Thank God that One the end can see. 
E'en from each small beginning ; 

Nor counts the life in vain to be 

That boasts no outward winning. 

Without a thought of human praise 



KATE B, W. BARNES. 219 

We '11 bravely bear each burden 
Until beyond these mortal days 

We clasp the longed-for guerdon ' 

Mrs. Barnes' faith and trust did not fail her, even to 
the end. In the last year of her life, when the sorrow of 
a loving father's loss was vet fresh upon her, she wrote : 

IN TIME OF TRIAL. 

Thou who knowest all our grief, 

Help us bear Thy holy will ; 
If Thou canst not give relief, 

Make us calm, serene and still. 
O our Father and our God, 

Bend our stubborn wills to Thine; 
Let the thorny path be trod 

Leaning on an Arm Divine ! 

All our dearest, fondest ♦"ies 

Are Dut tokens of 1 ny love ; 
Draw us by them t:i the skies, 

Help us raisi our thoughts above. 
Though earth's brightest links should brealf 

Thou unchanged wouldst yet remain 
Sorrows borne for Thy dear sake, 

Stronger make love's perfect chain. 

Death alone can ne'er divide 

Those whose hearts are true and fond 

In Thy love we still abide, 

We below — and they beyona • 

Though the form we can not see. 

Though the voice we can not hear — 



220 WAIFS AND THEir AUTHORS. 

They still live by Faith in Thee, 
And they are forever near ! 

Soon these severed lives will meet, 

Soon these broken ties unite ; 
O that hour of rapture sweet, 

In the land of love and light ! 
Can we not with patience wait 

Through these fleeting mortal years . 
Dear the joy that cometh late ! 

Pure the bliss that follows tears I 




JOHN H. YATES. 




HE plain, homely ballad has always been popular. 
Of late, the nriost popular newspaper poetry has 
M| taken form in the ballads of old people — that 
verse being oftenest copied which, in the assumed character 
of an old man or woman, most tenderly and pathetically 
recited the wrongs, the observations, or the reflections of 
age- Within two or three years past the name of John 
H. Yates has appeared in connection with such ballads 
oftener than any other, and the popularity his productions 
have enjoyed fairly entitles him to a place in this series of 
sketches. 

The first to win wide recognition among Mr. Yates' 
ballads, if we remember rightly, was 

THE OLD MAN IN THE NEW CHURCH. 

They 've left the old church, Nancy, and gone into a new ; 
There 's paintings on the windows, and cushions in each pew ; 
I looked up at the shepherd, then around upon the sheep, 
And thought what great inducements for the drowsy ones to 
sleep. 

Yes ! when I saw the cushions, and the flowers fine and gay 
In all the sisters' bonnets, I could n't help but say 
" Must I be carried to the skies on flowery beds of ease. 
While others fought to win the prize, and sailed through bloody 
seas ? " 



222 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

The preacher read the good old hymn sung in our youthful 

days — 
" Oh, for a thousand tongues to sing my great Redeemer's 

praise !" 
And, though a thousand tongues were there, they did n't catch 

the fire, 
And so the good old hymn was sung by a new-fangled choir. 

I doubt not but the people called the music very fine. 

But if they heard a word they said they 've better ears than 

mine ; 
For the new tune in the new church was a very twisting thing. 
And not much like the tunes of old that Christians used to 

sing. 

Why, Nancy, in the good old times, the singing sounded more 
Like the noise of many waters as they beat upon the shore ; 
For everybody knew the tunes, and everybody sang, 
And the churches, though not quite so fine, with hallelujahs 
rang. 

Now I 'm not an old fogy, but I sometimes want to scold, 
When I see our people leave good ways simply because they 're 

old. 
I 've served the Lord nigh forty years, and till I 'm neath the 

sod 
I shall always love the simple, good old ways of serving God. 

" The Lord's car is not heavy. " He can hear a sinner's cry 
In a church that is not painted like a rainbow in the sky ; 

" The Lord s arm is not shortened." He will save a sinner now, 
Though he may in lonely hovel, on a cold earth-altar bow. 

But they 've left the old church, Nancy, and gone into a new, 
And 1 fear they 've gone in more for style than for the good 
and true — 



JOHN. H, YATES. 223 

And from what little I heard said, I fear that sadder yet, 
In beating other churches, they 've got badly into debt. 

We did n't think of lotteries and grab-bags, years ago, 
As a means of raising money to make a better show ! 
When the church demanded dollars we all with one accord, 
Put our hands down in our pockets and gave them to the Lord. 

While I sat there at the meetin , looking 'round from pew to 
pew, 

I saw no familiar faces for the faces all were new ; 

When the services were ended, all the members passed me by. 

None were there to greet the old man with gray hairs and fail- 
ing eye. 

Then I knew that God had taken to the temple in the skies 
All the soldiers that with you and I fought hard to win the 

prize ; 
I some doubt if Christians now-a-days will reach the gates of 

gold 
Any better in the new ways than others did in the old. 

For the Lord looks not on tinsel, His spirit will depart 

When the love of earthly grandeur takes possession of the 

heart ; 
Oh ! I know the Lord of gflory will pass through a hovel door 
Sooner than through temple portals where are no seats for the 
poor. 

I-a a little while, dear Nancy, we will lay our armor down. 
And from the King Eternal we '11 receive our starry crown ; 
Then we '11 meet the blessed pilgrims that we worshiped with 

of old, 
And we '11 worship there, together, in the city built of gold. 



224 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



This, originally published in the Rochester Demo- 
crat and Chronicle, was generally copied by the press, but 
usually without credit, and of the many who have read 
it, few know even the author's name. It was followed by 
another depicting the New Church, and the worship in 
it, in detail, and entitled 

THE OLD MAN IN THE STYLISH CHURCH. 

Well, wife, I 've been to church to-day — been to a stylish one — 
And seein' you can't go from home, I '11 tell you what was 

done. 
You would have been surprised to see what I saw there to-day ! 
The sisters were fixed up so fine they hardly bowed to pray. 

I had on these coarse clothes of mine — not much the worse for 

wear — 
But then they knew I was n't one they call a millionaire ; 
So they led the old man to a seat away back by the door ', 
'T was bookless and uncushioned — a reserved seat for the poor. 

Pretty soon in came a stranger with gold ring and clothing 

fine ; 
They led him to a cushioned seat far in advance of mine. 
I doubted whether it was right to seat him up so near. 
When he was young, and I was old, and very hard to hear. 

But then, there 's no accountin' for what some people do ; 
The finest clothing now-a-days oft gets the finest pew. 
But when we reach that blessed home, all undefiled by sin, 
We '11 see wealth beggin' at the gate, while poverty goes in. 

I could n't hear the sermon. I sat so far away. 
So through the hours of service, I could only " watch and 
pray ; " 



JOHN H. YATES. 2:3 

Watch the doin's of the Christians settiu' near me 'round 

about ; 
Pray that God would make them pure within as they were pure 

without. 

While I set there, lookin' all around upon the rich and great ; 
I kept thinkin' 'bout that rich man and the beggar at his gate : 
How, by all but dogs forsaken, the poor beggar's form grew 

cold, 
And the angels bore his spirit to the mansions built of gold. 

How at last the rich man perished, and his spirit took its flight 
From the purple and fine linen to the home of endless night ; 
There he learned as he stood gazin' at the beggar in the sky, 
' It is n't all of life to live, nor all of death to die." 

I doubt not there were wealthy sires in that religious fold 
Who went up from their dwellings like the Pharisee of old ; 
Then returned home from worship with a head uplifted high. 
To spurn the hungry from their door with naught to satisfy. 

Out, out, with such professions ! they are doin' more to-day 
To stop the weary sinner from the gospel's shinin' way 
Than all the books of infidels ; than all that has been tried 
Since Christ was born in Bethlehem — since Christ was crucified. 

How simple are the works of God, and yet how very grand ; 

The shells in ocean caverns, the flowers on the land ; 

He gilds the clouds of evenin' with the gold-light from His 

throne — 
Not for the rich man only, not for the poor alone. 

Then why should man look down on man because of lack of 

gold? 
Why seat him in the poorest pew because his clothes are old ? 
A heart with noble motives, a heart that God has blest. 
May be beatin' Heaven's music 'neath that faded coat and vest. 
15 



2 26 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

I 'm old — I may be childish — but I love simplicity ; 
I love to see it shinin' in a Christian's piety. 
Jesus told us in His sermons, in Judea's mountains wild, 
He that wahts to go to Heaven must be like a little child. 

Our heads are growin' gray, dear wife — our hearts are beatin' 

slow, 
In a little while the Master will call for us to go ; 
When we reach the pearly gateway, and look in with joyful 

eyes, 
We '11 see no stylish worship in the temple of the skies. 

Another tollowed, which admirably portrays what 
the place and soirit of worship ought to be, and which 
has also become a waif : 

THE OLD MAN IN THE MODEL CHURCH 

Well, wife, I 've found the model church ! I worshiped there 

to-day ! 
It made me think of good old times before my hair was gray. 
The meetin' house was fixed up more than they were years ago, 
But then I felt when I went in it was n't built for show. 

The sexton did n't seat me away back by the door ; 
He knew that I was old and deaf, as well as old and poor ; 
He must have been a Christian, for you see he led me through 
The long aisle of that crowded church to find a place and pew. 

I wish you 'd heard that singin' ; it had the old-time ring ; 
The preacher said, with trumpet voice, " Let all the people 

sing ! " 
The tune was Coronation, and the music upward rolled, 
Till I thought I heard the angels striking all their harps of 

gold. 



JOHN H. YATES. 227 

My deafness seemed to melt away ; my spirit caught the fire ; 
I joined my feeble, trembling voice with that melodious choir, 
And sang, as in my youthful days, " Let angels prostrate fall ; 
Bring forth the royal diadem, and crown Him Lord of all." 

I tell you, wife, it did me good to sing that hymn once more ; 
I felt like some wrecked mariner who gets a glimpse of shore ; 
I almost wanted to lay down this weather-beaten form, 
And anchor in the blessed port forever from the storm. 

The preachin' ? Well, I can't just tell all that the preacher 

said ; 
I know it was n't written ; I know it was n't read. 
He had n't time to read it, for the lightning of his eye 
Went flashing 'long from pew to pew, nor passed a sinner by. 

The sermon wasn't flowery, 't was simple gospel truth ; 
It fitted poor X)ld men like me ; it fitted hopeful youth. 
'T was full of consolation for weary hearts that bleed ; 
'T was full of invitations to Christ, and not to creed. 

The preacher made sin hideous in Gentiles and in Jews ; 
He shot the golden sentences down in the finest pews. 
And — though I can't see very well — I saw that falling tear 
That told me Hell was some ways off", and Heaven very near. 

How swift those golden moments fled within that holy place ! 
How brightly beamed the light of Heaven from every happy 

face ! 
Again I long for that sweet time when friend shall meet with 

friend, 
Where congregations ne'er break up, and Sabbaths have no 

end. " 

I hope to meet that minister — that congregation, too — 
In that dear home beyond the stars that shine from heaven's 
blue. 



228 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

I doubt not I '11 remember, beyond life's evening gray, 
The happy hour of worship in the model church to-day. 

Dear wife, the fight will soon be fought — the victory soon be 

won ; 
The shinin' goal is just ahead ; the race is nearly run. 
O'er the river we are nearin' they are throngin' to the shore 
To shout our safe arrival where the weary weep no more. 

John Henry Yates lives in the village of Batavia, N. 
Y., where he was born Nov. 21st, 1837. His parentsi 
came from England, and he has the simplicity of manner 
which so characterizes the English common people. His 
mother was a school-mistress, and from her he inherited 
his literary taste. It was largely owing to her urgent 
desire that he began composition, and has since cultured 
his talent in that direction so far as he has. His educa- 
tion was not liberal, and much of his time since early 
boyhood has been passed in a store as clerk, yet he is well 
informed on general subjects, is conv^ersant with good 
literature, and does very acceptable pulpit service as a 
licensed preacher of the Methodist denomination, 
having a gift of sermonizing which answers instead of 
special culture. 

The world narrowly missed losing him as a ballad 
writer, in the claims of the church, for we doubt if as an 
* ' itinerant ' he would have essayed such ejffort as he has 
successfully put forth. A narrower miss though, was when 
he nearly lost his life, on two different occasions, while 
yet quite a youth — once by falling down a cellar, during 



JOHN H. YATES, 229 

a fire in Batavia, and again by falling on a bowie knife, 
while taking part in some amateur dramatics. In the 
first instance he struck his forehead upon a stone, and 
was many hours insensible from the blow, which left a 
broad scar ; the second accident was much more perilous, 
even, since the long, sharp knife-blade went clean through 
his right lung, and for weeks thereafter life hung as by a 
thread. 

The dominant feeling in Mr. Yates' heart seems to 
be that of love and veneration for the aged. His * * Old 
Man Ballads, "as he terms them, are quite numerous, 
and all are pro mpted by it. Perhaps his sympathy shines 
out as strongly as any where in the following, which origi- 
nally appeared in The Rochtster Sunday Morning Times : 

COIN' WEST TO DIE . 

V/ell, here we are, my dear old wife, on board the train at last ! 
Our little all packed in a trunk, with lock and straps made fast. 
I hear the bell a-ringin*, and the whistle's piercin' cry ; 
There, wife, we 're movin' out of town ! — we 're goin' West" to 
die ! 

We 've been from Jane's to John's house, from John's house 
back to Jane, 

Till, now, they 've laid their burdens down on board this Wes- 
tern train ; 

'T is rather hard to send us off, all crippled up and gray, 

To find a place in which to die, two thousand miles away. 

Since we broke up a keepin' house, they 've carted us around, 
Till, now, it seems, a home for us on earth can not be found : 



230 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



As sure as this old face of mine can ne'er look young again. 
So sure we '11 never more return to trouble John or Jane. 

They send us to a stranger land, o'er an untraveled road, 
That Mary, in her Western home, may bear the heavy load ; 
It is n't to be wondered at that my eyes are filled with tears. 
Or that my form is bendin' with more than weight of years. 

I did n't think 't would come to this — I did n't mean it 

should — 
No home is like your own home, tho' made of logs of wood. 
No bread is sweet when eating it 'mid bitterness and strife ; 
Few care to fill with peace and joy an old man's closing life. 

Now, o'er a long, untraveled road we seek a stranger land — 
The old home circle broken up at cruel time's command ; 
But time can not destroy our love, 't is stronger now than when 
Our heads wore not the silver locks of threescore years and 
ten. 

Since we broke up a keepin' house we 've led a wretched life ; 
Jane puts the blame upon her man, and John upon his wiie ; 
They think not of their infancy — of all those tender years 
When we toiled day and night for them, and wiped their flowin' 
tears. 

We leave behind us all the scenes of early years, dear wife ; 
And all the friends with whom we 've won the ictories of life 
We leave behind the little church, where oft we 've knelt in 

prayer, 
But, good wife, we will never leave the God that met us there. 

Although these eyes are growin' dim, I still can see to read 
The precious truths in God's own Word, that children all should 
heed : 



JOHN H. YATES. 23 1 

'Honor thy father, " saith the Lord, — " thy mother honor too : 
Then shalt thou live long in the land that God hath given 

you. *' 
Our latest day will dawn ere long — our journey's end is nigh — 
We 're goin* West to Mary's home, we 're goin' West to die ; 
Then He who sees the sparrow fall, who counts the oceans 

sands, 
Will take us to the better home — the house not built with 

hands. 

It will interest readers to know that among those 
who perused the above, on the day it came out, were a 
family in this city, one of whose number, an aged lady, 
was about to remove to take up a home with other rela- 
tives in the West. The preparations were all made, and 
she was to start next day ; but on reading the poem the 
entire family were so affected by it that the journey was 
at once given up, and the old lady will remain and die in 
Rochester. 

One of the "Old Man's Ballads" is entitled "To 
the Grave through the Poor-House Gate, " and the Old 
Man speaks thus forcibly of the pauper's unfeeling son : 

This heartless boy of his hadn't even a garret-room 
To offer to the poor old folks 'till earth should offer the tomb ; 
Not a crust of bread gave he from his acres of bursting sod ; 
If there is n't a hell for such a man, why, then there is n't a 
God. 

When the sowers go forth to sow, this miser sows liis grain, 
And the windows of heaven open to give the refreshing rain ; 



232 



WAIFS AND th::ir a uthors. 



When the reapers go forth to reap, his heavy wheat bows down, 
And his poor old father bowed to the charity of the town. 

The mercy of God is great ; the justice of God is sure : 
Man may, but He will never, lorsake the feeble and poor. 
Whatsoever we sow we reap. If we make others harvest tears. 
We may look for a weeping time when we bow with the burden 
of years. 

Mr. Yates wrote first for the Batavia papers — mainly 
for The Batavian, upon which he for a year or more ren- 
dered editorial assistance. Since then he has contrib- 
uted often to Rochester journals, and has been honored 
with place and illustration in Harper s Weekly and Har- 
per s Bazar. A political ballad which appeared in the 
former — "The Old Mangoes for Grant;" — was copied 
by all the Republican papers, as was a companion "The 
Boys in Blue go for Grant;" and "The Old Man in the 
Palace Car, " which appeared in the Bazar ^ has been 
widely printed throughout the West. Several later bal- 
lads, in spirit similar to the last named, have been exten- 
sively reproduced. 

Mr. Yates is not less effective when he assumes the 
woman's place, in age, than when he holds to his more 
frequent personification of the Old Man, as witness the 
lines entitled 

JOHN 'S GONE OFF TO-DAY. 

It has come about ' I feared it would ! yes, John 's gone off 

to-day, 
And left me alone on a mortgaged farm without any means to 

pay ; — 



JOHN H. YATES. 233 

Gone off with the very woman who has hated me for years — 
Who has planted my path with thorns, while I watered them 
with my tears. 

Perhaps 't is foolish to mourn ; perhaps 't is better so ; 

When love goes out of the dwelling the loveless man should go. 

But the heart can 't let go quickly from the one it has loved so 

long, 
Though suddenly comes the tempest, though terrible be the 

wrong. 

I gave him my youthful love in the far home over the sea ; 

Through all the years of our wedded life his heart had been 
true to me. 

Till this woman came to our table, with her fine sheep's cloth- 
ing on, 

To prove but a wolf, as she has to-day, by running away with 
John. 

It is hard to work, as I have worked for love and a home when 

old; 
Then find I have garnered nothing but fond hopes dead and 

cold. 
It is hard to love as I have loved, then hear the old neighbors 

say, , 
John would n't have done this wrong but I scolded him night 

and day. 

There is n't the proof in Scripture that Adam was drove to sin ; 
There is n't a wife around here more patient than I have been : 
A woman's tongue may drive a man out of the house for awhile, 
But to lead him astray from wisdom's way there 's nothing like 
her smile. 

'T was the smile of this evil woman, 't was the honeyed words 
of her tongue, 



234 



WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 



That shattered love's golden bowl, and love's tuneful harp un- 
strung, 

When the seroent's charm is broken, and John comes back to 
his mind, 

He will sigh again for the true love of the heart he has left 
behind. 

Will I run to the door to meet him ? Will I welcome him 

with a kiss ? 
Supposing I do, neighbor, will that be doing amiss ? 
It 's dangerous sailing without the man who has been at the 

helm so long ! 
And they who are prone to evil should learn to forgive a wrong. 

I often take my Bible, the well-worn one on the stand, 

And read of that prodigal son coming home from that famine 
land; 

Did n't the father run to meet him ? Did n't he kiss his re- 
penting boy? 

And order the fatted calf killed to make him a feast of joy ? 

So will I welcome John, when his wayward race is run ; 
Is not a prodigal husband as good as a prodigal son ? 
If I forgive his trespasses, obeying the law divine, 
The Lord who pities the erring will surely pardon mine. 

It will come about, it will ; yes, Tohn will come home soon : 
Together we'll mend love's broken bowl, love's golden harp 

we '11 tune ; 
Then the fatted calf I '11 kill, and the news I '11 spread around, 
My John, though dead, is alive again ; though lost, he now is 

found. 

In quite a different vein from either ballad we have 
given, but embodying memories common to us all, and 



/ 



JOHN H. YA TES. 235 

Tecalling the vanished days of youth in happy though 
half pathetic way, is the following, for which, of many 
ballads Mr. Yates has written, he has the fondest regard : 

IN THE OLD FORSAKEN SCHdOL- HOUSE . 

They 've left the school-house, Charley, where years ago we sat 
And shot our paper bullets at the master's time-worn hat. 
The hook is gone on which it hung, and master sleepeth now 
Where school-boy tricks can never cast a shadow o'er his brow. 

They 've built a new imposing one — the pride of all the town, 
And laughing lads and lasses go its broad steps up and down. 
A rower crowns its summit with a new, a monster bell, 
That youthful ears, in distant homes, may hear its music swell. 

I 'm sitting in the old one, with its battered, hingeless door ; 
The wdndows are all broken, and the stones lie on the floor ; 
I alone, of all the merry boys who romped and studied here, 
Remain to see it battered up and left so lone anu drear. 

I 'm sitting on the same old bench where we sat side by side 
And carved our names upon the desk, waen not by master 

eyed ; 
Since then a dozen boys have sought their great skill to display, 
And, like the foot-prints on the sand, our names have passed 

away. 

'T was here we learned to conjugate " Amo, amas, amat, " 
"While glances from the lasses made our hearts go pit-a-pat ; 
'T was here we fell in love, you know, with girls who looked us 

through — 
Your's with her piercing eyes of black, and mine with eyes of 

blue. 



236 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Our sweethearts — pretty girls were they — to us how very dear — 
Bow down your head with me, my boy, and shed for them. " 

tear ; 
With them the earthly school is out ; each lovely maid now 

stands 
Before the one Great Master, in the house not built with hands. 

You tell me you are far out West ; a lawyer, deep in laws, 
With Joe, who sat behind us here, and tickled as with straws ; 
Look out for number one, my boys ; may wealth come at your 

touch ; 
But with your long, strong legal straws, don't tickle men too 

much. 

Here, to the right, sat Jimmy Jones — you must remember Jim — 
He 's teaching, now, and punisning, as master punished him ; 
What an unlucky lad he was ! His sky was dark with woes ; 
Whoever did the sinning it was Jim who got the blows. 

Those days are all gone by, my boy ; life's hill we 're going 

down. 
With here and there a silver hair amid the school-boy brown ; 
But memory can never die, so we '11 talk o'er the joys 
We shared together in this house when you and I were boys. 

Though ruthless hands may tear it down — this old house lone 
and drear — 

They '11 not destroy the characters that started out from here ; 

Time's angry waves may sweep the shore and wash out all be- 
side — 

Bright as the stars that shine above, they shall for aye abide. 

I 've seen the new house, Charley ; 't is the pride of all the 

town, 
And laughing lads and lasses go its broad steps up and down ; 
But neither you nor I, old friend, can love it half as well 
As this condemned forsaken one with cracked and tongueless bell. 




■ The poor soldier in pain on the field with the slain, 

And the sailor afar on the foam, 
Brush the tear from the eye and look back with a sigh, 
As they think of the pleasures of home. 



Pa^e 237. 



JOHN H, YA TES. ' 237 

Mr. Yates does not confine himself to the style of 
ballad we have so largely shown, though he drops into it 
oftenest, and most naturally. He can do very satis- 
fying work in other styles, which may be seen, as we con- 
clude our sketch, in 

A SONG OF HOME . 

" There 's no place like home, " though 'neath bright skies we 
roam, 
In the lands where rare blossoms unfold ; 
For the joys of the hearth are the purest of earth, 
And its treasures more precious than gold ; 
♦■ How the eyes beam with love 'neath the lashes above, 
When our footsteps are heard at the door ; 
When we enter its bliss with a smile and a kiss, 
We feel care-worn and weary no more. 

Shine on, hearth and home, o'er life's billows of 

foam. 
Oh ! beautiful love-light ! beautiful home ! 

The poor soldier in pain on the field with the slain 

And the sailor afar on the foam, 
Brush the tear from the eye and look back with a sigh. 

As they think of the pleasures of home ; 
Then in dreams of the night they again, with delight, 

Join the circle they left at the hearth, 

d their hearts feel at rest, 'mid the scenes they love best, 

In the sunniest spot of the earth. 

The sweet nest in the wood to the lark seemeth good. 

While the eagle, with wings strong and free. 
Builds her home with the flags in the towering crags 



238 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



That o'erhang the white foam of the sea. 
O ! it is not the spot, be it palace or cot, 

That makes home the sweet Eden of earth — 
'T is the dear ones we meet in its blissful retreat, 

And the love that encircles the hearth. 

There are those on life's way who are homeless to-day, 

And they sigh as they wearily roam ; 
Through the fast falling tears they look back to the years 

That were spent in a beautiful home. 
While we then are so blest with this haven of rest, 

Let the home be made cheerful with love, 
For our life is a dream — we may soon cross the stream 

To the beautiful mansions above. 

Shine on, hearth and home, o'er life's billows of 

foam. 
Oh ! beautiful love-light ! beautiful home 





ETHEL LYNN BEERS. 

GENERATION or two must pass away before 
the phrase, ''All quiet along the Potomac, " can 
fade from popular remembrance. It was com- 
mon in news dispatches during the fall of 1861, and be- 
came familiar to us all through the public prints. In the 
issue of Harper's Weekly for Nov. 30, of the year named, 
a poem appeared which began by quoting this phrase, 
and which was at once republished in every journal in 
the land. It has not lost interest, even now. War is 
only a memory, but to many it is intensely vivid ; and 
there are thousands, in Southern homes as around North-- 
ern hearthstones, whose hearts will throb with a quickei 
pulsation as they read anew 

THE PICKE T- GUARD. 

" All quiet along the Potomac, " they say, 
" Except, now and then, a stray picket 
Is shot as he walks on his beat to and fro, 

By a rifleman hid in the thicket. 
'T is nothing — a private or two, now and then, 

Will not count in the news of the battle ; 
Not an officer lost — only one of the men 
Moaning out, all alone, the death-rattle. " 



240 WAIFS Al^D THEIR AUTHORS. 

All quiet along the Potomac to-day, 

Where the soldiers lie peacefully dreaming ; 
Their tents, in the rays of the clear autumn moon. 

Or the light of the watch-fire, are gleaming. 
A tremulous sign, as the gentle night-wind 

Through the forest-leaves softly is creeping ; 
While the stars up above, with their glittering eyes, 

Keep guard — for the army is sleeping. 

There 's only the sound of the lone sentry's tread 

As he tramps from the rock to the fountain, 
And thinks of the two in the low trundle-bed, 

Far away in the cot on the mountain. 
His musket falls slack — his face, dark and grirr\. 

Grows gentle with memories tender, 
As he mutters a prayer for the children asleep — 

For their mother — may Heaven defend her ! 

The moon seems to shine just as brightly as on 

That night when the love yet unspokei/ 
Leaped up to his lips — when low-murmured vows 

Were pledged to be ever unbroken. 
Then drawing his sleeve roughly over his eyes, 

He dashes off tears that are welling. 
And gathers his gun closer up to its place, 

As if to keep down the heart-swelling. 

He passes the fountain, the blasted pine-tree, • 

The footstep is lagging and weary ; 
Yet onward he goes through the broad belt of light, 

Toward the shade of the forest so dreary. 
Hark ! was it the night wind that rustled the leaves ? 

Was it moonlight so wondrously flashing ? 
It looked like a rifle — " Ha ! Mary, good-by !" 

And the life-blood is ebbing and plashing. 



ETHEL LYNN BEERS. 24 I 

All quiet along the Potomac to-night, 

No sound save the rush of the river ; 
While soft falls the dew on the fece of the dead — 

The picket 's off duty forever ! 

As originally published, its only hint of authorship 
was hid in the initials **E. B. " These lost sight of, as 
they speedily were, the poem became a waif, with no 
hint of authorship at all. By-and-by some journal fixed 
paternity upon it, to which it had no claim ; then it was 
claimed by those who could not prove their paternity. 
The London Times credited it to ''a Confederate soldier 
who died on the Potomac ; " and was corrected by an 
American paper, which declared that the verses ''were 
composed by a private soldier in the United States service, 
sent home in a letter to his wife, and first published in a 
Northern journal. " This statement was in turn met by 
another, asserting that they ''were the production of the 
lamentable Fitz James O'Brien, who was wounded at 
Ball's Bluff and died after his arm had been amputated. " 
Finally, under date of July 4th, 1863, Harper s Weekly al- 
luded to the vexed question, and settled it by saying : — 
"The poem was originally contributed to Harpers 
Weekly hy a. lady, and is copyrighted." Recognition of 
Lieut. O'Brien' s real contributions to that journal was 
made in the same paragraph, linked with the remark that 
the soldier-poet received his death-wound near Hancock, 
instead of at Ball's Bluff. 

When conflict ceased, th poem drifted into collec- 



242 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



tions of war verse, unjustly credited in each. It appeared 
in *'War Poetry of the South," edited by William Gil- 
more Simms, as a Southern production. A volume en- 
titled "The Library of Song," attributed it to Mrs. G. G. 
Howland. In correction of these errors, the New York 
Evening Post said : ' ' We have before us a note from Mr. 
H, M. Alden, the editor of Harper s Weekly, informing 
us that it was written by Mrs. Ethel Lynn Beers, and orig- 
inally contributed to Harper s Weekly. " 

Speaking of this poem, in a private letter, Mrs. 
Beers wrote: — *'The poor ^Picket' has had so many 
* authentic' claimants, and willing sponsors, that I some- 
times question myself, whether I did really write it that 
cool September morning, after reading ihe stereotyped 
announcement *A11 quiet, '&c., to which was added in 
small type 'A picket shot, '" Such questioning as this raises 
no doubt in the mind of any one beside. 

For some years "■ Ethel Lynn " was a nomme de plume 
often seen in various metropolitan journals, especially 
the New York Ledger. It was chosen by a young girl 
born and educated in Goshen, Orange County, N. Y., 
and rather proud of her surname Elliott — which had de- 
scended direct to her through seven gf^nerations from 
John Eliot, the Indian Apostle — as also very fond of the 
quaint old Saxon Ethelinda her parents bestowed, espe- 
\^ cially when modified by household rendering to the 
present cognomen. Married, but still clinging to her 



ETHEL LYNN BEERS. 243 

girlish appellation, Ethelinda Elliot became Ethel Lynn 
Beers, and one name is now as familiar as the others. 

Mrs. Beers wrote several poems during the war 
which attained popularity. Next to "The Picket- 
Guard, '' in hold upon public favor, and, like that, put 
forth through the patriotic pages of Harper s Weekly, was 
this : 

ON THE SHORES OF TENNESSEE . 

" Move my arm-chair, faithful Pompey, 

In the sunshine bright and strong, 
For this world is fading, Pompey — 

Massa won't be with you long ; 
And I fain would hear the south wind 

Bring once more the sound to me, 
Of the wavelets softly breaking 

On the shores of Tennessee. 

"Mournful, though, the ripples murmur 

As they still the story tell. 
How no vessels float the banner 

That I 've loved so long and well. 
I shall listen to their music. 

Dreaming that again I see 
Stars and Stripes on sloop and shallop 

Sailing up the Tennessee. 

" And, Pompey, while old massa 's waiting 
For Death's last dispatch to come, 
If that exiled starry banner 

Should come proudly sailing home 
You shall greet it, slave no longer — ' 



344 WAIJ^S AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Voice and hand shall both be free 
That shout and point to Union colors 
On the waves of Tennessee. " 

" Massa 's berry kind to Pompey ; 

But old darkey 's happy here, 
Where he 's tended corn and cotton 

For dese many a long gone year. 
Over yonder Missis' sleeping — 

No one tends her grave like me ; 
Mebbe she would miss the flowers 

She used to love in Tennessee, 

" 'Pears like she was watching, Massa — 

If Pompey should beside him stay, 
Mebbe she 'd remember better 

How for him she used to pray, 
Telling him that way up yonder 

White as snow his soul would be, 
If he served the Lord of Heaven 

While he lived in Tennessee. " 

Silently the tears were rolling 

Down the poor old dusky face. 
As he stepped behind his master. 

In his long-accustomed place. 
Then a silence fell around them. 

As they gazed on rock and tree 
Pictured in the placid waters 

Of the rolling Tennessee. 

Master, dreaming of the battle 

Where he fought by Marion's side, 

When he bid the haughty Tarleton 
Stoop his lordly crest of pride ; 

Man, remembering how yon sleeper 



E THEL L YNN BEERS. 245 

Once he held upon his knee, 
Ere she loved the gallant soldier, 
Ralph Vevair, of Tennessee. 

Still the south wind fondly lingers 

'Mid the veteran's silver hair ; 
Still the bondman close beside him 

Stands behind the old arm-chair. 
With his dark-hued hand uplifted, 

Shading eyes, he bends to see 
Where the woodland, boldly jutting, 

Turns aside the Tennessee. 

Thus he watches cloud-born shadows 

Glide from tree to mountain-crest, 
Softly creeping, aye and ever, 

To the river's yielding breast. 
Ha ! above the loliage yonder 

Something flutters wild and free ! 
" Massa ! Massa ! Hallelujah ! 

The flag 's come back to Tennessee ! " 

"Pompey, hold me on your shoulder. 

Help me stand on foot once more. 
That I may salute the colors 

As they pass my cabin door. 
Here 's the paper, signed, that frees you. 

Give a freeman's shout with me — 
God and Union ! ' be our watchword, 

Everaiore in Tennessee ! " 

Then the trembling voice grew fainter, 

And the limbs refused to stand ; 
One prayer to Jesus, and the soldier 

Glided to a better land. 



246 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

When the flag went down the river 

Man and naaster both were free, 
While the ring-dove's note was mingled 

With the rippling Tennessee. 

Not nearly so often read as the foregoing, yet more 
artistically wrought out, and having an irresistible touch 
of pathos at the close, is the following : 

THE TALLEST SOLDIER OF THEM ALL, 

How brave they looked with guns ashine, 

With floating flag and pennon gay ; 
How firmly trod the martial line, 

Through surging crowds along Broadway ! 
While women turned to say " Good-bye, " 

Through tears that would unbidden fall,] 
*, waiting, watched and saw but one, 

The tallest soldier of them all. 

On tip-toe 1 had buckled close 

A shoulder-strap that morn for him, 
But scarce could see the simple clasp, 

Through eyes with welling sorrow dim ; 
A^ith sad adieu and backward glance, 

He left me at the bugle's call. 
To pray that God would watch and keep 

The tallest soldier of them all. 



A squad went marching down the glen, 
Picked men and true, for earnest work ; 

To start from covert by the way, 
A foe who might in ambush lurk. 

With wary eye and rifle poised, 



ETHEL LYNN BEERS. 247 1 

1 

With bated breath and soft foot-fall, 

They followed through that narrow pass i 

The tallest soldier of them all. ^A 

I 

Along the crags the stained vines, 

Red with the ray October sheds, \ 

Fluttered and swung their trembling spray ^ 

Around two crouching rebel heads. - j 

Above the rock a flashing gleam, ;j 

Adown the glen a true sent ball, ] 

And there outstretched lay stark and still \ 

The tallest soldier of them all. \ 

They brought him back, my gallant love, ^ 

With solemn step and bugle wail, | 

They bore him through the crowded street, -\ 

My soldier murdered in the vale : '\ 

Pallid and still he lay at rest, '\ 

Beneath the sacred, starry pall, ,] 

So low at last / stooped to kiss, i 

The tallest soldier of them all. \ 

Mrs. Beers has written much verse, since early school- -^ 

days when the old garret was her sanctum, and her only H 

advisers were those parental. Perhaps tne most popular ' 

of her productions, since the war, is 1 

WEIGHI^iG 7 HE BABY. j 

" How many pounds does the baby weigh — 

Baby who came but a month ago ? >^ 
How many pounds from the crowning curl 

To the rosy point of the restless toe ? " i 

Grandfather ties the 'kerchief knot, .'■, 

Tenderly guides the swinging weight, - 



248 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

And carefully over his glasses peers 
To read the record, " only eight. " 

Softly the echo goes around : 

The lather laughs at the tiny girl ; 

The fair young mother sings the words, 

While grandmother smooths the golden curl. 

And stooping above the precious thing, 
Nestles a kiss within a prayer. 

Murmuring softly " Little one, 

Grandfather did not weigh you fair. " 

Nobody weighed the baby's smile, 

Or the love that came with the helpless one ; 

Nobody weighed the threads of care. 
From wuich a woman's life is spun. 

No index tells the mighty worth 
Of a little baby's quiet breath — 

A soft, unceasing metronome. 

Patient and faithful until death. 

Nobody weighed the baby's soul. 

For here on earth no weights there be 

That could avail ; God only knows 
Its value in eternity. 

Only eight pounds to hold a soul 
That seeks no angel's silver wing, 

But shrines it in this human guise. 
Within so frail and small a thing ! 

Oh, mother ! laugh your merry note ; 

Be gay and glad, but do n't forget 
From baby's eyes looks out a soul 

That claims a home in Eden yet. 



ETHEL LYNN BEERS. 



249 



It was penned while the author was a guest at a 
country home, where the infant of the household had 
been weighed the same morning. Nearly every newspaper 
reader is familiar with it, as also with the following, 
entitled 

GRANNIE'S TEST. 

Dear Grannie is with us no longer, 

Her hair that was white as the snow 
Was parted one morning forever, 

On her head lying softly and low ; 
Her hands left the Bible wide open, 

To tell us the road she had trod, 
"With waymarks like footsteps to show us 

The path she had gone up to God. 

No wonderful learning had Grannie, 

She knew not the path of the stars, 
Nor aught of the comet's wide cycle 

Nor Nebula's dim cloudy bars. 
But she knew how the wise men adoring 

Saw a star in the East long ago. 
She knew how the first Christmas anthem 

Came down to the Shepherds below. 

She never had heard of Hugh Miller, 

Nor knew what philosophers said ; 
The birthday of earth was a problem 

Which never disturbed her old head. 
About the Pre-Adamite fossils 

No mental disturbance she knew. 
Holding fast to her faith pure and holy, 

That her God-given Bible was true. 



250 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

She had her own test, I remember — 
For people, who e'er they might be. 
When we spoke of the strangers about us, 
But lately come over the sea ; 
Of " Laura, " and " Lizzie, " and " Jamie, " 

And stately old " Essellby Oakes, " 
She listened and whispered it softly — 

" My dear, ai-e these friends meetiii -folks ?''* 

When our John went away to the city 

With patrons, whom all the world knew 

To be sober and honest, great merchants. 
For Grannie this all would not do 

Till she 'd pulled at John's sleeve in the twilight 
To be certain, before he had gone ; 

And he smiled as he heard the old question — 
" Ai"e you sure they 're meetin'-folks, John ?" 

When Minnie came back from the city, 

And left heai-t and happiness there, 
I saw her close kneeling by Grannie, 

With the dear wrinkled hands on her hair ; 
And amid the low sobs of the maiden 

Came softly the tremulous tone — 
*' He was n't like meetin'-folks, Minnie ; 

Dear child, you are better alone. " 

And now from the corner we miss her, 

We hear that reminder no more ; 
But still, unforgotten, the echo 

Comes back from the far-away shore, 
Till Sophistiy slinks in the corner, 

Tho' Charity sweet has her due. 
Yet we feel, if we want to meet Grannie, 

'T were best to be meetin'-folks, too ! 



E THEL L YNN BEERS . 2 5 1 

These lines were written about the same time, and 
have been frequently printed. Can any sympathetic per- 
son read them aloud, without a tremor as of tears in his 
voice ? 

WHICH SHALL IT BE ? 

" Which shall it be ? which shall it be ? " 
I looked at John — John looked at me, 
(Dear, patient John, who loves me yet 
As well as tho' my locks were jet), 
And when I found that I must speak 
My voice seemed strangely low and weak. 

" Tell me again what Robert said ;" 
And then I list'ning bent my head. 

" This is his letter : " 

" I will give 
A house and land while you shall live, 
If, in return, from out your seven 
One child to me for aye is given. " 

I looked at John's old gai-ments worn, 

I thought of all that John had borne 

Of poverty and work and care, 

Which I, though willing, could not share ; 

I thought of seven mouths to feed, 

Of seven little children's need, 

And then of this. 

" Come, John, " said I, 
"We 'U choose among them as they lie 
Asleep ; " so walking hand in hand, 
Dear John and I surveyed our band. 
First to the crib we lightly stepped 



252 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

Where Lilian, the baby, slep.. 

Her damp cui'ls lay like gold alight 

A glory 'gainst the pillow white. 

Softly her father stooped to lay 

His rough hand down in loving way, 

When dream or whisper made her stir, 

And huskily said Tohn — " Not her. " 

We stooped beside the trundle-bed, 

And one long ray of lamp-light shed 

Athwart the boyish faces there 

In sleep so pitiful and fair ; 

I saw on Jamie's rough, red cheek 

A tear undried. Ere John could speak 

"He 's but a baby, too, " said I, 
And kissed him as we hurried by. 
Pale, patient Robbie's angel face 
Still in his sleep bore suffering's trace. 

"No, for a thousand crowns, not him, " 
We whispered while our eyes were dim. 
Poor Dick ! bad Dick ! our wayward son, 
Turbulent, reckless, idle one — 
Could he be spared ? " Nay, He who gave 
Bids us befriend him to his grave ; 
Only a mother's heart can be, 
Patient enough for such as he ; 
And so, " said John. " I would not dare, 
To send him from her bedside prayer. " 
Then stole we softly up above 
And knelt by Mary, child of love. 

"Perhaps for her 't would better be," 
I said to John. Quite silently 
He lifted up a curl that lay 
Across her cheek in wilful way. 



E THEL L YNN BEERS, 253 

And shook his head. " Nay, love, not thee, " 

The while my heart beat audibly. 

Only one more, our eldest lad. 

Trusty and truthful, good a"nd glad — 

So like his father. " No, John, no, 

I can not, will not let him go. " 

And so we wrote in courteous way 
We could not give one child away ; 
And afterward, toil lighter seemed, 
Thinking of that of which we dreamed, 
Happy in truth that not one face 
We missed from its accustomed place ; 
Thankful to work for all the seven.. 
Trusting the rest to One in Heaven. 

Quite unlike either of the foregoing, as to spirit, ex- 
pression and form, is 

THE GOLD NUGGET, 

What shining possibility 

Of coin and link, 

Glitter and blink, 

Oh yellow gold, 

Within thy hold. 
For all thy dull humility I 

Only the torment of the mill 
Has tried thy worth, 
Oh magic earth ; 
Soon shalt thou find 
How mortal mind 
Holds mastery o'er matter still. 



254 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

Then out from torture hot and slow, 
From fire and wheel, 
From rasping steel, 
From rolling band, 
And cunning hand. 

Thy better self shall rise and glow. 

Art thou a ring sought for a bride — 
Love's golden lock, 
Which change shall mock ? 
Oh, marriage ring, 
Close, closer cling, 

Though grief and sorrow shalt betide 

Art thou a pen, whose task shall be 

To drown in ink 

What writers think ? 

Oh, wisely write. 

That pages white 
Be not the worse for ink and thee. 

A clasp to hold the baby's sleeve, 
That shoulders white 
May shame the light ? 
Oh, kiss the skin 
Thy links within. 

Thy trac'ry on its whiteness leave, 

A golden eagle hidden close 

In miser's clutch, 

From gen'rous touch ? 

Oh, eagle fly 

Where misery 
For thee shall hide its wants and woes. 



E THEL L YNN BEERS. 255 

Be worthy of thyself, oh Gold ! 

By brain outwrought, 

By soft heart taught ; 

Call Charity to work with thee, 

To work with thee, 
And so be better than thy mold. 

"Our Folks" has genuine pathos; and ''Baby 
looking out for Me" — not a war poem — must touch any 
mother's heart when, after picturing the little one at the 
window pane, it speaks of 

Two little waxen hands, 

Folded soft and silently ; 
Two little curtained eyes, 

Looking out no more for me ; 
Two little snowy cheeks, 

Dimple-dented nevermore ; 
Two little trodden shoes, 

That will never touch the floor ; 
Shoulder-ribbon softly twisted, 

Apron folded, clean and white : 
These are left me — and these only 

Of the childish presence bright. 

While at times writing of commonplace things in a 
commonplace way, Mrs. Beers yet fails not often to catch 
a glimpse of some every-day lesson in an every-day garb, 
and effectively to apply it. Like so many sensitive na- 
tures, suggestions are very fruitful with her. Though 
seeming not to search after them, she finds one where 
others might almost seek in vain, as in 



256 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHOR'^. 

THE EVERGREEN'S MOAN. 

I thought in early spring, how fair 
'T would be to bloom forever ; 

To wear my gallant Lincoln green, 
Untouched by time or weather. 

I s-'w the maple's golden gown 
About her cold feet lying ; 

The oak-tree's dark and tattered cloak 
Off on the wild wind flying. 

The crimson knots fell one by one 
Off fiom the rose-tree's shoulder, 

And so untied its robe of green 
Ere autumn nights grew colder. 

The ripened grain waved me adieu ; 

The bird stopped, southward going, 
Then went his way. I watch alone 

The north wind coldly blowing. 

I would that I, too, with the rest 
Had been content to slumber : 

The robe of life I coveted 

Now clothes me but to cumber. 

There would have been then some regrets. 
Some whisper softly sighing 

When loit'ring lovers homeward went 
Through leaves about me dying. 

And this is why to wintry winds 
I tell my thrice-told story. 

Life, lonely life, when friends have gone. 
Is but a doubtful glory. 



E THEL L YNN BEERS. 257 

Mrs. Beers has written chiefly for Harper's Weekly, 
Harper s Magazine, New York Ledger, New York Obser- 
ver, Hearth of Home, and Illustrated Christian Weekly. 
Her only prose ventures, we believ^e, are "General 
Frankie " — a small volume published by Randolph & Co., 
which recalls some of the moral conflicts in the short life 
of one who sleeps under the daisies ; and a little Tract 
House story. She carries her conscience into all of her 
work, her chief desire, as she has once expressed it, being 
to write no word or line that should mislead an earnest 
soul. She finds life's pathos along its traveled ways, 
and beneath the common speech, and says when she 
brings her poems all together into a book she shall chris- 
ten them ''Burdocks and Daisies," since they have been 
gathered by the highway's dust, and within life's trodden 
courts. Mrs. Beers- is of medium stature, with dark hair 
and eyes, and lives in Orange, New Jersey. 




17 




ROSA H. THORPE. 

T is seldom that a historical incident forms the 
basis of a really popular poem. Rarer still is it 
that such a poem drifts up and down through 
the newspapers, year after year, unclaimed, the general 
wonder as to its authorship unsatisfied. In the time ol 
Cromwell, a young soldier, for some offense, was con- 
demned to die, and the time of his death was fixed at 
"the ringing of the curfew." Every effort to avert his 
fate proved unavailing. The young girl for whom his 
life held most, pleaded tearfully with the judges, and 
even petitioned Cromwell himself, but in vain. Almost 
despairingly, she sought to bribe the sexton, in hope that 
for once a day might fade to darkness with no curfew's 
knell ; but the faithful old man was true. The hour of 
execution drew nigh ; every preparation was complete ; 
the condemned and his executioner stood waiting in the 
sunset light for a signal which did not sound. Long after- 
wards that strange and fortunate silence, and its comfor- 
ting results, found explanation in the simple yet touching 
ballad of 

" CURFEW MUST NOT RING TO-NIGHT, " 

Slowly England's sun was setting o'er the hill-tops far away, 
Filling all the land with beauty at the close of one sad day, 
And the last rays kissed the forehead of a man and maiden 
fair 



26o 'WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

He with footsteps slow and weary, she with sunny, floating 

hair ; 
He with bowed head, sad and thoughtful, she with lips all cold 

and white. 
Struggling to keep back the murmur — 

" Curfew must not ring to-night. " 

"Sexton, " Bessie's white lips faltered, pointing to the prison'old, 
With its tui-rets tall and gloomy, with its walls dark, damp and 
cold, 
"J. 've a lover in that prison, doomed this very night to die. 
At the ringing of the Curfew, and no earthly help is nigh ; 
Cromwell will not come till sunset," and her lips grew strangely 

white 
As she breathed the husky whisper : 

" Curfew must not ring to-night. " 

"Bessie," calmly spoke the sexton — every word pierced her 
young heart 
Like the piercing of an arrow, like a deadly poisoned dart, 
"Long, long years I 've rung the Curfew from that gloomy, 
shadowed tower ; 
Every evening, just at sunset, it has told the twilight hour ; 
I have done my duty ever, tried to do it just and right, 
Now I 'm old I still must do it. 

Curfew it must ring to-night. " 

Wild her eyes and pale her features, stern and white her 

thoughtful brow, 
And within her secret bosom Bessie made a solemn vow. 
She had listened while the judges read without a tear or sigh : 
"At the ringine of the Curfew, Basil Underwood must die." 
And her breath came fast and faster, and her e es grew large 

and bright — ' 
In an undertone she murmured : 

"Carfew must not ring to-night.'" 



ROSA H. THORPE. 26 1 

She with quick steps bounded forward, sprung within the old 
church door, 

Left the old man threading slowly paths so oft he 'd trod be- 
fore ; 

Not one moment paused the maiden, but with eye and. cneeic 
aglow, 

Mounted up the gloomy tower, where the bell swung to and fro 

As she climbed the dusty ladder on which fell no ray of light, 

Up and up — her white lips saying — 

" Curfew shall not ring to-night. " 

She has reached the topmost ladder, o'er her hangs the great 

dark bell ; 
Awful is the gloom beneath her, like the pathway down to hell. 
Lo, the ponderous tongue is swinging, 't is the hour of Curfew 

now, 
And the sight has chilled her bosom, stopped her breath and 

paled her brow. 
Shall she let it ring ? No, never ! Flash her eyes with sudden 

light. 
And she springs and grasps it firmly — 

*' Curfew shall not ring to-night !" 

Out she swung, far out, the city seemed a speck of light below, 
'Twixt Heaven and earth her form suspended, as the bell swung 

to and fro. 
And the sexton at the bell-rope, old and deaf, heard not the 

bell. 
But he thought it still was ringing fair young Basil's funeral 

knell. 
Still the maiden clung more firmly, and with tremblmg lips 

and white. 
Said to hush her heart's wild beating — 

" Curfew shall not ring lo-night. " 



262 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

It was o'er, the bell ceased swaying, and the maiden stepped 

once more 
Firmly on the dark old ladder, where for hundred years before 
Human foot had not been planted. The brave deed that she 

had done 
Shoula be told long ages after, as the rays of setting sun 
Should illume the sky with beauty ; aged sires with heads of 

white, 
Long should tell the little children 

Curfew did not ring that night. 

O'er the distant hills came Cromwell ; Bessie sees him, and her 

brow, 
Full of hope and full of gladness, has no anxious traces now. 
At his feet she tells her story, shows her hands all bruised and 

torn ; 
And her face so sweet and pleading, yet with sorrow pale and 

worn. 
Touched his heart with sudden pity, lit his eye with misty light ; 
"Go ! your lover lives," said Cromwell, 

" Curfew shall not ring to-night ! " 

It was in April, 1867, that another young girl first 
read the incident here told. She chanced upon it in a 
little story entitled "Love and Loyalty, " and it haunted 
her like a dream, absorbed her thought, and wholly unfit- 
ted her for study, until, underpretextof studiousness, with 
slate, pencil and arithmetic in hand, she wrote out her 
rhythmic version. Her name was Rosa Hartwick, and 
she lived in Litchfield, Mich. She was then only about 
sixteen years old, having been born July 18, 1850, in 
Mishawaka, Ind. Rhyming was natural to her, though 



IIOSA H, THORPE. 26$ 

at this time she had written Httle, and published next to 
nothing. Indeed this poem, the most successful she has 
ever penned, was not printed until the fall of 1870, when 
it was sent to the Detroit Commercial Advertiser^ and called 
forth a letter of hearty recognition from the editor thereof. 

Miss Hartwick began writing for Young America — 
a magazine for youth — but has contributed chiefly to the 
press of Michigan, her adopted State. She wrote many 
poems before her twentieth year, some of which, in sugges- 
tion and style, siand as witnesses for her work in the 
stanzas already quoted. We give place to one entitled 

DOWN THE TRACK. 

In the deepening shades of twilight, 

Stood a maiden young and fair ; 
Raindrops gleamed on cheek and forehead — 

Raindrops glistened in her hair. 
Where the bridge had stood at morning, 

Yawned a chasm deep and black ; 
Faintly came the distant rumbling 

From the train far down the track. 

Paler grew each marble feature. 

Faster came her frightened breath, — 
Charlie kissed her lips at morning — 

Charlie rushing down to death ! 
Must she stand and see him perish ! 

Angry waters answer back ; 
Louder comes the distant rumbling 

From the train far down the track. 



264 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

At death's door faint hearts grow fearless; 

Miracles are sometimes wrought, 
Springing from the heart's devotion 

In ihe forming of a thought. 
From her waist she tears her apron, 

Flings her tangled tresses back, 
Working fast and praying ever 

For the train far down the track, 

See ! a lurid spark is kindled, 

Right and left she flings the flame, 
Turns and glides with airy fleetness 

Downward toward the coming train ; 
Sees afar the red eye gleaming 

Through the shadows still and black ; 
Hark ! a shriek prolonged and deafening, 

They have seen her down the track ! 

Onward comes the train — now slower. 

But the maiden, where is she ? 
Flaming torch and flying footsteps. 

Fond eyes gaze in vain to see. 
With a white face turned to Heaven, 

All the sunny hair thrown back. 
There they found her, one hand lying 

Crushed and bleeding on the track. 

Eager faces bent above her, 

Wet eyes pitied, kind lips blest ; 
But she saw no face save Charlie's — 

'T was for him she saved the rest. 
Gold they gave her from their bounty ; 

But her sweet eyes wandered back 
To the face whose love will scatter 

Roses all along life's track. 



ROSA H. THORPE 265 

This is but the versification of an actual incident, as 
1-ecited years ago in a newspaper paragraph. It is in such 
realistic effort that the author appears happiest, and 
to it she seems most inclined. From a series of legends, 
which her pen has decked out in rhyme, we take this : 

THE L UCK OF MUNCA S TER . 

Beside the crystal well she stood, 

Fair Margaret, Lowther's daughter, 
The hazel eyes smiled back at her 

Up from the sparkling water. 
The sunlight fell on tresses bright, 

Tresses half brown — half golden. 
While at her feet Lord William knelt 

And told the story olden. 

An outlaw border chieftain he, 

Of haughty mein and carriage, 
With earnest words on bended knee, 
Besought her hand in marriage. 
"My lile with thine," the lady said, 
" Can never be united ; 
To brave Sir John, of Muncaster, 
This hand of mine is plighted." 

•' My vengeance," cried the dark -browed Scot, 
" On thee, proud Lowther's daughter. 
This lord of thine shall not be safe 

From me on land or water. " 
Disdainful smiled the lady stern, 

" Thy threats are unavailing, 
While Sir John owns the sacred cup 
Mischance can ne'er assail him. 



266 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

" 'T was Henry, Sixth, pronounced the charm, 

(A glass cup was the token), 
' In Muncaster good luck shall reign 

Till this charmed cup is broken. ' 
A hundred years the charm hath held 

Its power beyond undoing ; 
Good luck attends Muncaster lords 
In battle and in wooing. " 

"And this the luck of Muncaster?" 

Said the rejected lover. 
" The charm hath stood a hundred years, 
It shall not stand another. " 
Then straight to Carlisle tower he rode. 

" My lord, " he cried, " make ready, 
For Douglass comes with Scottish hordes ; 
Each arm is strong and steady. 

"Prepare to give them battle now, 
And mete out justice measure ; 
Or send some trusted messenger 

For thy most valued treasure. " 
'" Small treasure have I, " Sir John said, 

" But one in casket oaken 
I fain would save from plundering hand 
Untarnished and unbroken, 

*' Go thou and bring the gem I prize ; 

Thou art no foe or stranger, 
Else why hast rode this weary way, 

To warn me of my danger ? " 
And ere the bat had winged its flight 

Across night's sable curtain, 
The dark browed knight of Liddersdale 

Had done the messafje certain. 



ROSA H. THORPE. 267 

" Now, by my ladie' s lips, I swear, 
Thy friendship is amazing, " 
Cried gay Sir John, of Muncaster, 
Into the dark face gazing. 
" Swear not by lips of her you love, 
You never more shall press them ; 
Bright are the locks of Margaret's hair, 
No more shalt thou caress them, " 

Exclaimed the fiery Scot in glee, 

'•I hold the precious token. 
That binds good luck to thee and thine — 

That charmed spell shall be broken. 
Behold ! I dash it to the earth, 

In vain thy deepest regret ; 
Douglass shall win thy palace tower. 

And / the lady Marg'ret. " 

The traitor fled. Sir John sank down 

Beside the casket oaken. 
Oh, miracle ! the crystal cup 

Lay there unharmed, unbroken. 
Two thousand soldiers came in time 

To stay the Douglass slaughter, 
And gay Sir John was married to 

Fair Margaret, Lowther's daughter. 

Miss Hartwick was married in 1871, to Edmund C. 
Thorpe, and soon went to reside in Fremont, Ind., where 
she has lived since, until lately returning to Litchfield. 
Domestic cares have left her small opportunity for com- 
position, and little from her pen has of late appeared 
in print, save the wandering waif so universally read. 



268 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

She has made a collection of her poems, with a view to 
early publication in book form. From the few at our 
hand we will give only one more entitled 

WAITII^G. 

When the dusky shadows o'er the earth are spread, 
Nestling 'mid the pillows of her trundle bed, 
Peering through the darkness, roguish little Miss, 
Waiting in the twilight for a mother's kiss. 

Pretty, thoughtful maiden, dreaming dreams of love. 
Gazing at the spangled, moonlit sky above ; 
Looking down the pathway with an anxious eye, 
Waiting for her lover, coming by-and-by. 

When the golden sunbeams slant across the floor. 
Stately little woman standing in the door. 
Making a sweet picture in her tidy dress. 
Waiting for her husband and a fond caress. 

Weary, anxious mother, years of toil and care 
Threading lines of silver in her sunny hair: 
Breezes kiss her forehead, balmy, soft and cool. 
Waiting for the children coming home from school. 

By the shady window in her easy chair, 
With the sunlight resting on her snowy hair. 
Grandmother is waiting in the dear old home. 
Waiting till the Master gently bids her come. 

Waiting /or her loved ones, this is woman's lot, 
In the stately palace or the lowly cot, 
And when death shall claim her she will go before, 
And await their -coming on the other shore. 



/^OS \ //. THGA'PE. 269 

Mrs. Thorpe is tall and slender, has dark brown 
eyes, and hair to match. She lives more in the ftiture 
than the past ; and has the hopefulness of a poet, blent 
with much of a poet's sensitive disposition. In writing, 
she sympathizes intensely with her theme, and is often 
carried forward resistlessly, without due heed to finish of 
versification and accuracy of rhyme. But however much 
or carefully she may write in future, she can hardly pro- 
duce anything which shall win the popularity her earliest 
ballad has achieved. 





GEORGE W. BUNGAY. 

HE subject of this sketch found recognition as a 
Newspaper Poet many years ago, though just 
how early he began writing verse we cannot say. 
Choosing literature as a profession, his pen has been 
very prolific, and some of its emanations have attained 
unusual popularity. If we mistake not, the first poem 
of his which came to be a waif, was 

" BLESS GOD FOR RAIN . " 

' Bless God for rain ! " the good man said, 

And wiped away a grateful tear ; 
That we may have our daily bread, 

He drops a shower upon us here. 
Our Father ! Thou who dwellest in Heaven, 

We thank Thee for the pearly shower ! 
The blessed present Thou hast given 

To man, and beast, and bird and flower. 

The dusty earth, with lips apart, 

Looked up where rolled an orb of flame, 
As though a prayer came from its heart 

For rain to come ; and lo ! it came ! 
The Indian corn, with silken plume. 

And flowers, with tiny pitchers filled, 
Send up their praise of sweet perfume. 

For precious drops the clouds distilled. 



272 WAIFS AI^D THEIR AUTHORS, 

The modest grass is fresh and green ; 

The brooklet swells its song again ; 
Methinks an angel's wing is seen 

In every cloud that brings us Rain. 
There is a rainbow in the sky, 

Upon the arch where tempests trod ; 
God wrote it ere the world was dry — 

It is the autograph of God. 

Up where the heavy thunders rolled, 

. And clouds of fire were swept along, 
The sun shines in a car of gold. 

And soaring larks dissolve in song. 
The rills that gush from mountains rude, 

Flow trickling to the verdant base, 
Just like the tears of gratitude 

That often stain a good man's face. 

Great King of Peace, deign now to bless ; 

The windows of the sky unbar ; 
Shower down the rain of Righteousness, 

And wash away the stain of War ; 
And let the radiant bow of Love 

In beauty mark the moral sky. 
Like that fair sign unrolled above, 

But not Uke it to fade and die. 

This appeared originally in Burritt's Christian Citizen 
— a periodical contemporaneous with Grahams Magazine 
in its palmy days. Copied into the New York Trib- 
une, the poem was at once republished in other jour- 
nals, and for a long time held place among estrays. Its 
composition was quite impromtu. Mr. Bungay, travel- 
ing to meet a lecture appointment when drouth was 



GEORGE W.BUNGAY 273 

scorching the land, was delayed by a heavy shower, and 
chafed over the detentian. Arriving late where his audi- 
ence waited, he found them talking of the rain, in thank- 
ful mood that was like a rebuke to his irritation — indeed 
the feeling of all present seemed to syllable itself in the 
expression of one happy farmer among the outsiders — 
''Bless God for rain!" The poem was born of this 
sentimsnt, and, forthwith written down, was sent off un- 
corrected for publication — an inspiration of the hour, 
lacking the best artistic finish, perhaps, but aglow with 
the hour's feeling and the picture's rainbow light. 

Mr. Bungay's rhythmic products would fill a volume. 
They have been generally of the popular, spontaneous 
kind, on a level with popular apprehension. His lively 
railroad lyric, also one of the earliest from his pen, full 
of nerve and fire, and having somewhat of prophetic 
vision in it, has been everywhere read. It went the 
rounds in this country and in England nearly twenty 
years ago, and was handsomely spoken of by the English 
press, especially the London Athenceum : 

THE LOCOMOTIVE . 
"Look out for the cars while the bell rings. " — Railroad Crossing. 

With lungs of fire and ribs of steel, 
With shrieking valve and groaning wheel, 
With startling scream and giant stroke. 
Swift showers of sparks and clouds of smoke. 
The iron horse the train is bringing, 
So look out while the bell is ringing. 
18 



■i 

A 

274 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, \ 

A sheet of fire illumes the track ' 

When night rules in her tent of black ; \ 

The furiou? steed then comes to us 1 

Like an express from Erebus, :j 

Around us blazing cinders flinging, -^ 
So look out while the bell is ringing. 

Ye gazing, gaping crowds, stand back ! ! 

Will ye be crushed, or clear the track? j 

"Aboard ! aboard I " and off again ! i 

The drones behind can't reach the ^rain ; ' 
They stumble where the switch is swinging, 
So look out while the bell is ringing. 

Just so the engine of reform "^ 

Is rolling on through sun and storm, ;j 

O'er swords and scepters, creeds and thrones i 

And bringing bread instead of stones. \ 

'T freedom's song the mass is singing, , : 
So look out while the bell is ringing. 

The slave will doff his yoke and chain, j 

The drunkard will not drink again, i; 

The warrior throw his sword away ; ; 

We see the dawn of that bright day ! ^, 

Glad news the harnessed steed is bringmg, ' j 

So look out while the bell is ringing. J 

Geo. W. Bungay is a New-Yorker by birth, and has | 

numbered fifty-four years. He was educated mainly at \ 

the metropolis, pursuing classical studies in a private in- .1 

stitute, famous in its day, known as ' ' the Orchard Street '\ 

School." Recommenced public life as an advocate of 1 

Temperance and Freedom. Three years he edited the % 



GEORGE W. BUNGAY. 275 

Ilion Independent, in the village of Ilion, Herkimer county, 
N. Y. Its circulation becoming large, he removed to 
Utica to obtain better adv^antages, and continued his 
paper under the name of the Central Independent, until 
Civil War began. Invited by Mr. Greeley, then, to take 
an editorial chair in the Tribune office, he remained there 
until the war ended, when he resigned to enter the lecture 
field. 

Mr. Bungay's writings and lectures have yielded him 
a good income and have made him widely known. His 
volume entitled ''Crayon Sketches and Off-Hand Tak- 
ings, " has passed through several editions, and was re- 
printed in London. His most popular lectures are ' ' The 
Comic Side of Life, " " Head Work and Hand Work, " 
and ''Jolly Fellows" — each subject being indicative or 
the lecture's spirit and aim. As a lecturer, Mr. Bungay 
has met with excellent success ; his lively wit and rol- 
licking humor never failing to amuse and interest, as his 
genuine common sense never fails to instruct. An earnest 
and enthusiastic reformer, he has done efficient service for 
Right, both with tongue and pen ; and still he wearies not, 
though Wrong prevails, and evil sways the world. 

The poem by Mr. Bungay now most often read, is 
quite in contrast with the two waifs given. Like those, 
it has been printed over and over again in the newspapers, 
and has also found frequent place in school reading books 
and works on elocution. Read as we have heard it, b^ 
finished elocutionist, its eff'ect is very beautiful. 



276 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHOR'^;. 

THE CREEDS OF THE BELLS. 

How sweet the chime of the Sabbath bells ! 
Each one its creed in music tells, 
In tones that float upon the air, 
As soft as song, as pure as prayer 
And I will put in simple rhyme 
The language of the golden chime ; 
My happy heart with raptui-e swells 
Responsive to the bells, sweet bells. 

*Ye purifying waters swell ! " 
In mellow tones rang out a bell : 

" Though faith alone in Christ can save, 
Man must be plunged beneath the wave, 
To show the world, unfaltering faith 
In what the sacred Scripture saith ; 
Oh, swell ' ye rising waters, swell ! " 
Pealed out the clear-toned Baptist bell. 

"Oh, heed the ancient landmarks well ! " 
In solemn tones exclaimed a bell ; 

' No progress made by mortal man 
Can change the just, eternal plan ; 
"With God there can be nothing new ; 
Ignore the false, embrace the true, 
"While all is well ! is well ! is well ! " 
Pealed out the good old Dutch church bell. 

*In deeds of love excel ! excel ! " 
Chimed out from ivied towers a bell, 

* This is the church not built on sands, 
Emblem of one not built with hands ; 
"^ts forms and sacred rights revere — 



GEORGE W. BUNGAY. 277 

Come worship here ! come worship here ! 
In rituals and faith excel ! " 
Chimed out ihe Episcopalian bell. 

* Not faith alone, but works, as well, 

Must test the soul ! " said a soft bell, 
' Come here and cast aside your load, 

And work your way along the road, 

With faith in God, and faith in man, 

And hope in Christ, where hope began ; 

Do well ! do well ! do well ! do well ! '* 

Rang out the Unitarian bell. 

" To all the truth we tell, we tell ' " 

Shouted, in ecstacies, a bell ; 
*' Come all ye weary wanderers, see ! 

Our Lord has made salvation free. 

Repent, believe, have faith, and then 

Be saved ! and praise the Lord ! Amen ! 

Salvation 's free ! we tell ! we tell ! " 

Shouted the Meihodistic bell. 

*' Farewell ! farewell ! base world, farewell ! " 

In touching tones exclaimed a bell ; 
"Life is a boon to mortals given. 

To fit the soul for bliss in Heaven ; 

Do not invoke the avenging rod, 

Come here and learr the way to God ; 

Say to the world * farewell, farewell ! "* 

Pealed forth the Presbyterian bell. 

*' In after life there is no hell ! " 

In raptures rang a cheerful bell ; 
" Look up to Heaven this holy day 

When angels wait to lead the way : 



278 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

There are no fires, no fiends to blight 
The future life ; be just and right 
No hell ! no hell ! no hell ! no hell ! " 
Rang out the Universalist bell. 

" The Pilgrim Fathers heeded well 
My cheerful voice ! " pealed forth a bell ; 

" No fetters here to clog the soul ; 
No arbitrary creeds control 
The free heart and progressive mind 
That leave the dusty paths behind. 
Speed well ! speed well ! speed well ! speed well I '* 
Pealed forth the Independent bell. 

" No pope, no pope, to doom to hell 

The Protestant ! " rang out a bell. 
" Great Luther left his fiery zeal 

Within the hearts which truly feel 

That loyalty to God will be 

The fealty that makes men free. 

No images where incense fell ! " 

Rang out old Martin Luther's bell. 

"All hail, ye saints in heaven that dwell 
Close by the cross ! " exclaimed a bell ; 

" Lean o'er the battlements of bliss, 
And deign to bless a world like this : 
Let mortals kneel before this shrine, — 
Adore the water and the wine ! 
All hail, ye saints ! the chorus swell ! " 
Chimed in the Roman-Catholic bell. 

" Ye workers who have toiled so well 
To save the race ! " said a sweet bell, 

" With pledge, and badge, and banner, come. 
Each brave heart beating like a drum ; 




Each one its creed in music tells — 

In tones that float upon the air 

As soft as song, as pure as prayer." Pa^e 279. 



GEORGE W. BUNGAY. 279 A 

Be royal men of noble deeds, 

For love is holier than creeds : ;' 

Drink from the well, the well, the well ! " j 

In rapture rang the Temperance bell. ,;■ 

In blank verse, so difficult of praiseworthy accom- 'i 

plishment, Mr. Bungay has shown a happy grace. We I 

make this extract from a poem on "■ Days :" '■' 

1 

Like flocks of migratory birds a-wmg, ^ 

The by-gone days sweep o'er the sea of time ; . ^ 

On, on to the eternal calm they speed ! ~\ 

One is baptized to sad and bitter tears, 'j 

And bears an arrow 'neath its drooping wing ; ■ ') 

One crimsoned o'er with battle's gory stain, 'i\ 

One scarred and battered by the winds and waves .^ 

Sobs out the grief of shipwrecked mariners — 

Days the bright sun mistook for blackest night. y 

But low, amid the flying flock I see, l 

Like doves with rooks, fair, golden days like this, ,; 

Filled to the sunset with the song of birds, " 

And starred all over with the noblest deeds. f 

\ 

A poem entitled ''The Mountain, " begins with this ■ 

admirable figure : \ 

Behold the mountain monarch on his throne '•■ 

Of granite, robed in mist, and crowned with light ! [ 

The sea, which sighs forever at his feet, " 

Showers kisses on him from the lips of shells, ;; 

And breaks like a great heai't upon the shore. 1 

Coquetting clouds, flushed with the tints of morn, '* 

Fold their soft arms about his ample neck, ;.i 



28o WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

And on his shoulders weep delicious showers, ■ 
While he, like a stern gallant, stands unmoved. 

As another and concluding specimen of Mr. Bun- 
gay's blank verse, we give the following : 

THE NIGHT WIND . 

The sun, wrapped in a cloud of mist, dropped out 
Of sight, and left the sky in widowed robes 
Without a star to light the solitude, 
When from a rent in the thick threatening heaven, 
Out stole the ruffian wind, on mischief bent. 
At midnight, while reposing on my couch, 
His stealthy hand came feeling at my door, 
And at the lattice, till the frozen glass 
Pealed out like bells held in the fairy hands 
Which wrote the flourishes in frost-work there ; 
Thrusting his arm through every open pane, 
Rattling the blinds, and scaring sleep away — 
Piping a low bass on the chimney's flute. 
Unhinging careless gates, and swinging signs, 
And with his lips upon a thousand tubes 
At once, blew a loud universal blast. 
He woke a rose-lipped maiden from her dreams. 
Then from the bent mast shook her sailor-boy 
Into the watery grave he scooped for him ; 
Returning then on wings invisible. 
Shrieked in her ears the stoiy of his death. 

Intensely practical and suggestive as is Mr. Bungay, 
he is in keenest sympathy with nature, and catches much 
of his inspiration from natural scenes. Several poems on 



GEORGE W. BUNGAY, 28 1 

Birds betray his love for the songsters of the wood. In 
one of these he says : 

Like a sad heart bereaved of rest, 

Whose hopes are fled that used to be, 
Is the blithe hang-bird's lonely nest 

That swings in silence on the tree. 
No bud to bloom, no beak to sing. 

No flower to greet the longing eye, 
No oriole with sunny wing. 

No song between us and the sky. 

Perhaps the best, at least the most generally known, 
of his bird poems, is this, entitled 

THE ENGLISH SPARROW. 

Blithe wanderer of the wintry air. 
Now here, now there, now everywhere, 

Quick drifting to and fro, 
A cheerful life devoid of care, 

A shadow on the snow. 

The shade of summer flecks thy wings, 
A- pleasant thought thy soft note brings. 

Fair foreigner of song ; 
The grass again in greenness springs. 

Where thy wings flit along. 

Brown sparrow, fluttering near my door, 
Whose latch locks not against the poor, 

I scatter crumbs for thee ; 
For thou art welcome evermore. 

To share my loaf with me. 



282 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Why leave thy snug, warm nest to-day, 
Thy downy sheets and walls of clay, 

And hospitable eaves ? 
Why wander from thy home away 

When trees have lost their leaves ? 

There are no berries on the tree, 
No seeds unhusked, no buds for thee, 

So come to my abode. 
Come share my hospitality, 

And cheer my solitude. 

Welcome from merry England's shore 
Dear visitor from door to door — 

A living link thou art. 
To bind us closer than before. 

To homes so near the heart. 

A winged herald flying free, 

With memories sweet from sea to sea. 

And dreams that fancy weaves 
Of legend, love and history, 

Come lodge beneath my eaves. 

In i-ealms above the star-lit wall, 
Our Father, watching over all, 

To thee extends His care ; 
He notes the wee brown sparrow's fall 

Through the unchartered air. 

Speaking of trees, Mr. Bungay expresses his regard 
for, and thought concerning them — the former as strong 
and intense as the latter is impressive and full of solem- 
nity — in these lines: 



GEORGE W.BUNGAY, 283 

The trees are teachers that I love, 

"Whose leafy book I oft have read ; 
Their limbs point to the world above, 

Their roots point to the world that *s dead j 
Oh solemn thought ! the woods so lorn 

In winter, and in spring so fair, 
Hold in their trunks for the unborn, 

Cities and ships, and coffins, there. 

One of Mr. Bungay's mosi admired poems pictures 
a snow-fall and its exquisite effects, and is entitled 

THE ARTISTS OF THE AIR. 

Lo, sifted through the winds that blow, 
Down comes the soft and silent snow. 
White petals from the flowers that grow 

In the cold atmosphere. 
These starry blossoms, pure and white. 
Soft falling, falling, through the night. 

Have draped the woods and mere. 

The busy artists of the air, 

Unseen, came down the stormy stair, 

To carve the wings of cherubs fair, 

On the fresh mounds of snow. 
Down the white ladder from aloft, 
From round to round, their steps so soft 

Disturbed no sleep below. 

So lightly fell their winged feet. 
The flakes ol snow could not repeat 
Their beauty on the stainless sheet 
That covered hill and plain. 



284 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

They graved devices on the post, 
Which stood there, like a "sheeted ghost, " 
And on the w^indow pane. 

On stoop and fence, and walk and door, 

Were mottoes never cut before. 

In white words, which the winds encore, 

When from the sea they sweep. 
Eagles of crystal, stars and shields, 
Were scattered over battle-fields. 

Where our loved heroes sleep. 

While we were sleeping on our beds, 
And snow fell on our beai-ds and heads 
That melts not, when the sunshine sheds 

Its warmth from Heaven above, 
These artists, with a skillful hand, 
Wrote syllables of snow that stand, 

For memory and love. 

And when the cloudless morning came. 
To light the world with torch of flame, 
A shaft of snow with wreaths of fame 

Stood near the silent mound 
Of one, who sleeps in dreamless peace 
Beneath the soft and stainless fleece. 

That covei"b all the ground. 

In rhythmical music, true delicacy of sentiment, 
real beauty of figure and perfect tenderness ot expression, 
Mr. Bungay has never excelled the following, albeit 
rarely indulging sentiment of its kind. It deserves perpet- 
uation among the gems of affectionate tribute : 



GEORGE W . BUNGAY. 285 

THE CAPTAIN'S SWEETHEART. 

I go down to the sea, 

Where the waves speak to me 
Of my darling, the soul of my soul ; 

But her footprints no more 

Mark the desolate shore 
Where she tempted the billows to roll. 

There the sad billows break, 

Like my heart for her sake, 
On the lonely and desolate shore ; 

For the waves of the sea 

Are now sighing with me, 
For a mortal, now mortal no more. 

With my heart filled with tears, 

And my hopes chilled with fears, 
By the grave of my darling I knelt, 

And 1 uttered a prayer 

On the listening air, 
Whose dew wept the sorrow I felt. 

There the winds wove a shroud 

Of a dim passing cloud, 
Betwixt me and the bright stars above, 

And the form in its fold. 

Like the shape in the mould, 
Was the form of the angel I love. 

Would that I were a flower, 

Born of sunshine and shower, 
I would grow on the grave of the dead, 

I would sweeten the air 

With the perfume of prayer. 
Till my soul on its incense had fled. 



286 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

And I never would fade 

In the delicate shade 
Of the tree, in whose shadow she lies. 

There my petals should bloom 

By her white rural tomb, 
When the stars closed their vigilant eyes. 

Now I see her in dreams 

On the banks of the streams, 
In the sweet land of exquisite bUss, 

Where the sweep of her wings, 

And the song that she sings, 
Oft awake me to sadness in this. 

Mr. Bungay has been a frequent contributor to the 
Tribune, Independent, Christian Union, and other periodi- 
cals. His most recent journaHstic work was as Lit- 
erary Editor of The Metropolitan, while it existed as a 
weekly journal in New York, and for which he did some 
very excellent writing. 

Mr. Bungay is of medium stature, full built in form, 
active and vigorous in movement, and of disciplined 
mental habit. He is a good story-teller in private or in 
public, and thoroughly genial. The dominant senti- 
ment of his life is reformatory and religious, and he 
promises many more years of zealous work for the com- 
mon good. 




MARY CLEMMER, 

|NLY a few years have elapsed since the broad 
door of journalism was opened to w^man-kind. 
Magazine literature gave the sex some earlier 
opportunities, but tnese were improved in a timid, desul- 
tory way, and promised little. Not that women failed to 
seek literary employment, for they did seek it ; but 
they sought it in the spirit of amusement and recreation, 
rather than in earnest, persistent service. The hard toil, 
the exacting drudgery, the tiresome activities of a real pro- 
fessional life, were thought undesirable, were even regard- 
ed unfit. But the field of woman's work haS' widened, 
until it takes in every kind of endeavor ; and the wil- 
lingness and ambition of woman have increased until in 
even the severer branches of journalistic labor she ex- 
cels. In reportorial correspondence, and as editorial 
writers, a few women have made brilliant successes, and 
by performing well their daily tasks have earned hon- 
orable fame. Ranking first, perhaps, among these, is the 
lady who wrote 

THE CHILDLESS MOTHER, 

I lay my tasks down one by one, 

I sit in the silence in twilight's grace ; 

Out of its shadow, soft and dun, 
Steals like a star my baby's face. 



288 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Mocking cold are the world's poor joys, 
How poor to me all its pomp and pride I 

In my lap lie the baby's idle toys, 
In this very room the baby died. 

I will shut these broken toys away 

Under the lid where they mutely bide ; 

I will smile in the face of the noisy day, 
Just as if baby had never died. 

I will take up my work once more 

As if I had never laid it down. 
Who will dream that I ever wore 

Motherhood's regal, holy crown ? 

Who will deem my life ever bore 

Fruit the sweeter in grief and pain ? 
The flitting smile that the baby wore 

Outrayed the light oi the loftiest brain. 

I '11 meet him in the world's rude din, 
Who hath outlived his mother's kiss, 

Who hath forsaken her love for sin — 
I will be spared her pang in this. 

Man's way is hard and sore beset ; 

Many may fall, but few can win. 
Thanks, dear Shepherd I My lamb is safe. 

Safe from sorrow, and safe from sin. 

Nevertheless, the way is long, 

And tears leap up in the light of the sun, 

I 'd give my world for a cradle song, 
And a kiss from baby — only one. 

Mary Clemmer, author of this tenderly exquisite 
waif began literary eifort as so many others have begun 



MAJ^V CLEMMER. 2^9 

it, with no very serious intent. Lively and facile of ex- 
pression, she took to using the pen for diversion's sake. 
By-and-by its use became a habit, and after a time her 
vague, aimless aspirations crystallized into definite pur- 
pose and unremitting hard work. Since then she has 
made herself one of our few successful feminine jour- 
nalists, winning popular reputation first as a correspond- 
ent, but regularly employed also as an editorial contribu- 
tor later on. 

Mrs. Clemmer was born at Utica, N.Y., in the month 
of April, 1839. Her father, Abram Clemmer, was born 
in Pennsylvania, of sturdy Huguenot descent; and his 
wife — Margaret Kneale — came from the Isle of Man. 
As a child she was attractive and graceful, and early 
showed unusual mental gifts. She wrote quite passable 
rhyme when but eleven years old. .M'assachusetts becom- 
ing her home, she was mainly educated at the Academy 
in Westfield, where she received much encouragement 
from the Principal, Professor Goldthwaite. Recognizing 
in her an intellect of great promise, and a specially poetic 
nature, he freely extended sympathy and aid. Her first 
poetry was published in the Westfield News -Letter, and 
afterwards in a Boston paper. While still in her "teens, '' 
before any realization of life and its realities, of her 
own powers and possibilities, had dawned upon her, she 
married Mr. Ames, a young clergyman of the Presbyte- 
rian church. It was not a fortunate union. Husband and 
wife in declaration, the two were never more than friends 
19 



290 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

in fact, and for reasons wise and right in the estimation 
of both, they legally separated a few months ago, each 
retaining the good will of the other, Mrs. Ames resuming 
her maiden name. Her former husband remains on 
friendly terms with her, and bears ready testimony to her 
virtues. 

Among the earlier published poems by Mrs. Clem- 
mer, the following has long been a favoriie, and is widely 
admired : 

WORDS FOR PARTING. 

O, what shall I do, dear, 

In the coming years, I wonder. 
When our paths, which lie so sweetly near, 

Shall lie so far asunder ? 
O, what shall I do, dear, 

Through all the sad to-morrows, 
When the sunny smile has ceased to cheer 

That smiles away my sorrows ? 

What shall I do, my friend. 

When you are gone forever ? 
My heart its eager need will send 

Through the years to find you never. 
And how will it be with you. 

In the weary world, I wonder ; 
Will you love me with a love as true, 

When our paths lie far asunder ? 

A sweeter, sadder thing 

My life, for having known you ; 
Forever with my sacred km. 

My soul's soul, I must own you. 



MARY CLEM MER 291, 

Forever mine, my friend, 

From June to life's December ; 
Not mine to have or hold. 

But to pray for and remember. 

The way is bhort O friend, 

That reaches out before us ; 
God's tender heavens above us bend, 

His love is smiling o'er us. 
A little while is ours 

For sorrow or for laughter ; 
I '11 lay the hand you love in yours 

On the shore of the Hereafter. 

As we have intimated, Mary Clemmer commenced 
her real literary life as a newspaper correspondent. This 
was soon after her marriage, and she wrote letters from 
New York to the Utica Morning Herald, a journal al- 
ways noted for the excellence of its correspondence. 
Later, she delighted a large constituency, through the 
Indepmdmt, with "A Woman's Letters from Washing- 
ton, " which were often wise, as often witty, and always 
bright, hearty, healthy and readable, and which v/ere a 
notable feature in that paper's make-up. Enjoying a long 
residence at the Nation's Capital, she came to know many 
secrets of political history, and to realize the general 
deceit and trickery prevalent ; but despite this, she kept 
her woman's heart true to its purest instincts, and held on 
and still holds on to her natural faith in the noble and 
the good. That she longs sometimes for a different at- 
mosphere, this extract will show : 



292 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

" This letter is only a good-morning and a good-evening, 
dear friends — a salutation on tlie threshold of winter, as we meet 
once more with all the fair summer between us and our last good- 
by. The world I have left and the world I meet do not easily 
coalesce. The strength begotten of mountain heiglits ; the peace 
of stormless lakes ; the pervasive fragrance ot the autumnal 
woods ; the music of a tiny leaf stirring in the blue air ; the 
rustle of a squirrel scampering through the crisp ferns, with his 
winter nuts ; the lowing of the litile black cow, bossed like jet 
against the twilight sky, coming home across the russet flat — all 
these sights and sounds of a far-off pastoral sphere have come 
with me hither. Their music is in my ears and their love in my 
heart, as I confront this other world that is * no relation of mine * 
— the world of rush and hurry and roaring streets ; the world of 
vanity and show ; of policy, treachery and place ; of shallow in- 
sight, of harsh misjudgment, and of broken faith. This is not m.y 
world. I confess to a reluctant hand that lifts a pen to tell you of 
its doings. I am in it, but not of it. " 

And there are hints here of a soul in harmonic rela- 
tion to the soul of Nature, which find fuller expression 
in these lines, originally contributed to the Independent : 

ARBUTUS. 

Dear, dear Arbutus, thou dost bring 
Far more to me than tint of Spring, 
More than her far and faint perfume, 
Into this dim and dusty room. 
We are old friends, Arbutus. So 
I saw thee smiling long ago. 
Where is the child that culled and sung ? 
Afar I see her fair and young . 



MARY CLEM MER, 293 

Unto the woman's pleading touch 
Yields the old sweetness — this is much ; 
All that thou gavest to me then, 
And how much more thou givest again.- 
This April morn thou art the same 
As when unto the child thou came. 
The shadow life hath o'er me flung 
Doth reach me not, oh, sweet and young .' 

Our love and sorrow mutely trace 
The lines of life upon the face ; 
But deeper in the soul do write 
All they have wrought afar from sight. 
The rose of youth, its fadeless grace, 
Liveth alone on Nature's face. 

Thus, dear Arbutus, thou dost bring 
Far more to me than tint of Spring, 
Than hint of far-off bursting brooks, 
Of woody banks and noiseless nooks, 
Where thy shy sisters hide and peer 
Through leafy veils, with smile and tear, 
The coyest coquettes of the year. 

'Mid din of street and rush of men 
Thou makest all earth young again. 
Thou say'st : "Far from men and mart. 
Still yearns thy mighty mother's heart ; 
She sends thee me thy heart to move, 
Fresh token of her changeless love. 
She says: 'Come back, oh ! life-worn child ; 
Drink from my springs the undefiled.' " 

Deep, deep within my solitudes 

The soul of peace and soothing broods, 

Half silent, all with life astir ; 



29^/ 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

The morning murmur of the fir, 
At dawn's high calm above the hill ; 
The thread-like ripple of the rill, 
Lapsing through mosses fringing cool ; 
The stillness of the lilied pool ; 
The calmness of the mountain crown, 
Poising a star the night -drops down : 
The rhythm of the awful sea, 
Rolling from out eternity, 
Calling, calling, eternally ! 

Till thou beyond the ocean's bar. 
Beyond the gleam of sun or star. 
Do seem to feel the Soul from far, 
From whom it rolls, from whom we are. 
The while the long, long tides bear in 
Treasure and wreck, with muffled din, 
Then break in music's pulsing thrill 
A.long die sands when winds are still. 

' When thou, poor soul, hast had thy iill 
Of swift, loud life, yet yearning still 
For all thou hast not, bliss unfound. 
Beyond thy speech or bein^g's bound, 
Turn thou unto thy first love's grace ; 
Come thou and lay thy faded face 
Upon my bosom. Thou wilt see 
That all that never faileth thee. 
Abiding ever, changing not 
'With any chance of mortal lot 
Or any coldness of the heart, 
Beyond the ken of human art. 
Beyond all human power to give, 
Deep in the universe do live, 



MARY CLEMMER. 295 

Nor change nor death can them destroy, 
The youth of Nature, Nature's joy. " 

Arbutus, thou dost faintly swing 

The subtle censer of the Spring. 

I sip thy wine, I kiss thy lips, 

I softly touch thy pinky tips ; 

More than I say art thou to me, 

A past and still a joy to be ! 

If e'er I stand of all bereft. 

As they do stand whom Death has left, 

A treasure dearer far than gold 

Mine empty hands will seek and hold, 

The first Arbutus of the Spring ; 

A simple thing, a little thing, 

Yet incense-bearer to the King, 

His tidings glad borne on its wing ! 

AH my lost life 't will backward bring, 

And all the life before 't will touch 

With Spring's young glory. 'T will be much — 

How much ! Yet such a little thing — 

The first Arbutus of the Spring ! 

Mrs, Clemmer was literally in the War, was under fire 
many times, saw heavy battles, and was taken prisoner 
once, with Mr. Ames. Although not ''Eirene, " as a 
person, the ' ' Diary, " and the chapter on the ' ' Surrender 
of Maryland Heights, " in her novel of that name, were 
personal experiences. The following ringing stanzas 
were written in Virginia, in sight of the regiment to which 
they were addressed, and will recall a thrilling picture 
in the minds of many who were long accustomed to the 
suggestive order 



2^5 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

''FALL IN. " 

See, see ! yon gleaming line of light, 

The enemy's bayonets bristle bright ; 
O, boys, there '11 be a fight to-night. 
Fall in ! 

Under the woods of frozen larch, 

Under the night sky's icy arch, 
It ends at last, the dreadful march • 
Fall in ! 

Fall in ! no bivouac to-night ; 

Beneath the stars so still and bright, 
The glistening bayonets glitter white ; 
Fall in! 

Fall in ! we 're hungry, bruised and torn ; 
With -snow and rain beaten and worn. 
Yet " ready for duty, " we 've proudly sworn ; 
Fall in ! 

A second for dreams ! Under our eyes. 
Oh see, how softly they seem to rise. 
The hills of home and her summer skies ! 
Fall in ! 

One sigh for home, for the fair face prest 

Close to the heart, 'neath the rugged vest, 
The face of the one we love the best • 

Fall in ! 
O, say, for a flash shall the brown face pale. 

The quick, young nerves in their warm life quail, 
To meet the thud of leaden hail ? 
Fall in ! 

The storm of shells, the bullet's whir. 
The clash of sabre no fear can stir ; 



MARY CLEMMER. 297 

We fight for freedom, for home, for her ! 
Fall in ! 

Ever with steady step we go, 

With rifles ready in serried row, 
Into the face of the insolent foe, 
Fall in ! 

Our hearts up-leap in passionate pain, 

O, see, they fall, our heroic slain, 
The enemy's masses charge and gain ! 
Fall in ! 

Fall in ' the eager bugles beat ; 

Fall in ! march on with prescient feet. 
Smite low the foe, where the armies meet ; 
Fall in ! 

To front ! its ranks are red and thin. 

The victor flaunts his banner of sin ; 
O, comrades, forward ! to die or win, 
Fall in : 

No Other woman of our acquaintance — we had al- 
most said no othei person — has performed such an 
amount of Uterary labor in a given time as Mrs. Clem- 
mer's record shows. For three years her average work in 
Washington, as we happen to know, was seven newspa- 
per letters each week ; and in addition to this she pro- 
dticed four books in four years — a task sufficient of itself 
to consume all her time and strength. She entered into 
contract with the publishers of one journal to write a col- 
umn a day for three years, and at the end of that time 
she had not missed a day. The wonder is that producing 



298 



WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 



so much, she has uniformly produced so well. All her 
books have taken form under stress of wearing daily 
duties, and yet each witnesses to the hand of an artist. 
''Eirene, or A Woman's Right, " published serially in 
Putnam s Magazine, was soon succeeded by "A Memo- 
rial of Alice and Phoebe Gary," from the Riverside Press. 
" Outlines of Men, Women and Things" came next, fol- 
lowed shortly by ''Ten Years in Washington, " published 
in 1872 by A. D. Worthington & Co., Hartford, as a sub- 
scription book, and immensely successful. ' * His Two 
Wives, " her latest volume, was written as a serial for 
Every Saturday, and published in complete form re- 
cently by Hurd & Houghton. Perhaps her most hal- 
lowed work is the Memorial to the Cary sisters, full of affec- 
tionate tenderness and sensitive appeciation — a tribute 
which does scarcely less honor to her womanly generosity 
than to their memory and worth. The long-time inii- 
mate companion of the two poetesses, she has linked her 
name indissolubiy with theirs as their biographer and 
friend. 

Light, airy and playful as Mrs. Clemmer's writings 
often are, one needs only to read a chapter or two of the 
''Memorial" to see how deeply sympathetic her nature 
is. This same tenderness of sympathy and sentiment 
finds frequent expression in her verse, as in the following : 

GOOD-B Y , SWEE THE A R T . 

Good-by, sweetheart, 

I leave thee wiih the loveliest things 

The beauty^burdened sprinor-time brings, 



MARY CLEMMER, 299 

The anemone in snowy hood, 
The sweet arbutus in the wood. 
And to the smiling skies above 
I say, Bend brightly o'er my love. 
And to the perfume-breathing breeze 
I sigh, Sing softest symphonies ! 
O, lute-like leaves of laden trees 
Bear all your sweet refrain to him, 
While in the June-time twilights dim 
He thinks of me as I of him. 
And so good-by, sweetheart ! 

Good-by, sweetheart ! 
I leave thee with all purest things. 
That when some fair temptation sings 
Its luring song, though sore beset. 
Thou 'It stronger be. Then no regret 
Life-long will after follow thee. 
With touches lighter than the air, 
I kiss thy forehead brave and fair, 
And say to God this last deep prayer : 

guard him always, night and day, 
So from Thy peace he shall not stray! 
And so good-by, sweetheart! 

Good-by, sweetheart, we seem to part I 
Yet still withni my inmost heart 
Thou goest with me. Still my place 

1 hold in thine by love's dear grace ; 
Yet all my life seems going out. 

As slow I turn my face about. 
To go alone another way. 
To be alone till life's last day, 
Unless thy smile can light my way. 



300 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Good-by, sweetheart. The dreaded dawn, 
That tells our love's long tryst is gone, 
Is purpling all the pallid sky, 
As low 1 sigh, sweetheart, good-by ! 

She is deeply religious as well. Mingling much and 
long with the gayeties of fashionable society, flattered and 
caressed by wealth and position as genius ever is, she 
still with longing heart looks away from these allurements 
here, to 

SOMETHING BEYOND. 

Something beyond ! Though now, with joy unfound, 

The life-task falleth from thy weaiy hand, 
Be brave, be patient ! In the fair Beyond 
Thou 'It understand. 

Thou 'It understand why our most royal hours 

Couch sorrowful slaves, bound by low nature's greed ; 
Why the celestial soul 's a minion made 
To narrowest need. 

In this pent sphere of being incomplete, 

The imperfect fragment of a beauteous whole. 
For ^'on rare regions, where the perfect meet, 
Sighs the lone soul. 

Sighs for the perfect ! P'ar and fair it lies ; 

It hath no half-fed friendships perishing fleet, 
No partial insight, no averted eyes, 
No loves unmeet. 

Something beyond ! Light for our clouded eyes ! 

In this dark dwelling, in its shrouded beams, 
Our Best waits masked ; few pierce the soul's disguise ; 
How sad it seems 



MARY CLEMMER. 30 1 

Something beyond ! Ah, if it were not so, 

Darker would be thy face, O brief to-day ! 
Earthward we 'd bow beneath life's smiting woe, 
Powerless to pray. 

Something beyond ! The immortal morning stands 

Above the night ; clear shines her prescient brow ; 
The pendulous star in her transfigured hands 
Brightens the Now. 

Nevertheless, she recognises the power which can 
bless and make glad our being of to-day, — she does not 
cry out against mcrtality as if it were a thing orphaned of 
God — but conscious of divine presence, and the possibil- 
ities of divine help, she hymns her trust thus reverently to 

THE CHRIST. 

Thou livest on the earth, dear Lord ! 

Thou art not far away — 
A name within a misty word — 

Thou 'rt with us here to-day. 

We 've listened to the battle's shock, 

The weary cry of creeds. 
Unmoved the Shepaerd of His flock 

His loving people leads. 

Thou livest on the earth, dear Lord ! 

What tears of sorrow flow, 
What toil there is — what poor reward, 

What want Thy children know. 

Thou livest on the earth to-day, 
Wherever Patience stands, 



302 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS, 

Where holy Love kneels down to pray, 
Where Faith uplifts her hands. 

And thus alike in storm or shine 

We lift our eyes to see 
Thy lovely face, Thy face divine, 

Thy face that makes us free. 

Free from the shadovs^ sin has cast, 

Free from all passions ill, 
And free to rest when life is past, 

In regions fair and still. 

So fearing much, and loving much, 

The tides of life we stem, 
And stretch a faltering hand to touch 

Thy far-off garment's hem. 

That haply to our souls at length. 

Thy saving grace may flow, 
And we may gain the winged strength. 

Thy ransomed children know. 

So halting, falling often in 

The kingdom of our birth, 
What joy ! Our Heavenly Kinsman still 

Walks with us on the earth. 

Mrs. Clemmer is described as being ''tall and stately, 
with dark brown hair, brilliant blue eyes, and with a 
beaming expression of frank kindness that prepares you 
for the vivacity and sweetness of her conversation. " Her 
character, as portrayed by her friends, and judged by her 
books, is that of one fearless, true and strong; impulsive, 
yet generous in temper, and with a large and noble char- 
ity for all. 




HARRIET PRESCOTT SPOFFORD. 



POME souls there are that seem close linked with 
the great heart of Nature by cords most delicate 
and sensitive. The glory of day, the glamour 
of night, the witchery of wind and wave, the wooing 
sense of tone and color, the gladness of spring and the 
glow of autumn, take hold upon them irresistibly, mas- 
ter them, control them, possess them. They are true 
poets, even though they never attempt poetic expression. 
They have a more perfect communion with the soul of 
poetry than lips can syllable or pen depict. Here and 
there may be found one who unites to this marvelous sym- 
pathy a marvelous art — the art of perfect description, of 
vivid portrayal, in which every tint is preser/ed, every 
symbol interpreted, every thought vivified and made 
clear. Pre-eminent among these is the author of 

A FOUR-O'CLOCK. 

A.h, happy day, refuse to go ! 
Hang in the heavens forever so ! 
Forever in mid afternoon, 
Ah, happy day of happy June ! 
Pour out thy sunshine on the hill, 
The piny woods with perfume fill, 
And breathe across the singing sea 
Land-scented breezes that shall be 



^04 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

Sweet as the gardens that they pass. 
Where children tumble in the grass ! 

Ah, happy day, refuse to go ! 
Hang in the heavens forever so ! 
And long not for thy blushing rest 
In the soft bosom of the West, 
But bid gray evening get her back 
With all the stars upon her track ! 
Forget the dark, forget the dew. 
The mystery of the midnight blue. 
And only spread thy wide warm win_^s 
While summer her enchantment flings : 

Ah, happy day, refuse to go ! 

Hang in the heavens forever so ! 

Forever let thy tender mist 

Lie like dissolving amethyst 

Deep in the distant dales, and shed 

Thy mellow glory overhead ! 

Yet wilt thou wander — call the thrush, 

And have the wilds and waters hush 

Tohear his passion-broken tune, 

Ah, happy day of happy June ! 

Among the early contributors to The Atlantic and 
Harper s Magazim, the name of Harriet Prescott was 
often seen, and it speedily became associated, in the 
minds of appreciative readers, with a powerful imagina- 
tion, rare grace uf farlcy, and lavish wealth of diction. 
The descriptive sketches and stories with which it was 
connected had a character, an individuality, peculiarly 
their own, and gave promise of exceptional literary per- 



HARRIET PRESCOTT SPOFFORD. 305 

formance later on. They all testified, with more or less 
emphasis, that here was a strongly poetic nature, express- 
ing itself through the ordinary forms of prose. Critics 
found some fault with the writer's art — it was too prod- 
igal of pigments, they thought, too extravagant, too 
like a very spendthrift of riches. But they were 
generous. They offered the common excuse of youth in 
behalf of her who, we suspect, would not have offered any 
excuse for herself; and they waited patiently for the bet- 
ter art, or what they were pleased to believe would be the 
better art, in work of maturer years. 

Meanwhile the stories crystallized into books, and 
multiplied their friends. The first volume was " Sir Rol- 
and's Ghost, " published in i860, and succeeded by *' The 
Amber Gods and Other Stories, " which received wider 
perusal, and was followed in turn by "Azarian. " ''Aza- 
rian, An Episode" the author calls it, in half humility. 
"Azarian, A Life, " would be truer as a title, so much of 
richly endowed being is embodied in it. It is altogether 
unique. It has no rival ; it can have none. In color it is 
a genuine Raphael ; the tone is that of Beethoven, with 
all his exquisite possibilities. .The "Moonlight Sonata" 
is more than hinted of in one touch : 

" He leaned over his boatside — miles away from any shore, a 
star looked down from far above, a star looked up from far below, 
che glint passed as instantly, and left him the sole spirit between 
immense concaves of void and fullness, shut in like the flaw in a 
diamond. " 



3o6 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

''Azarian" is more than a story, although a very- 
readable story it is : — it is a beautiful bouquet, of hues 
the most brilliant, and heavy with perfume. Another 
tribute to bud and bloom, so free, so unstinted, yet so 
choice, can not anywhere be shown. Its entire atmos- 
phere is charged with the flavor and sweetness of flowers, 
and none who read it will be surprised at chancing upon 
some dainty "Flower Songs " from the same pen, one of 
which is breathed by 

THE ROSE. 

I am the one rich thing that morn 
Leaves for the ardent noon to win ; 

Grasp me not, I have a thorn, 

But bend and take my fragrance in. 

The dew drop on my bosom gives 

The whole of heaven to searching eyes : 

Only he who sees it, lives, 

And only he who slights it dies. 

Ah ! what bewildering warmth and wealth 

Gather within my central fold ! 
Love-lorn airs of happy health 

Hive with the honey that I hold. 

This dazzling ruddiness divine 

Shrouds spicy savors deep and dear ; 

Passion's sign and countersign. 

The inmost meaning of the sphere. 

Petal on petal opening wide. 
My being into beauty flows — 



HARRIE T FRESCO TT SPOFFGRD. 307 

Hundred-leaved and damask-dyed — 
Yet nothing, nothing but a rose. 

Not alone does color hide in the heart of the rose 
and the veins of the violet. There is crimson in the sun- 
set, azure in the sea. A hundred dyes lurk in the world 
around — in forest, wave and sky — seen of the few only, 
it is quite possible, unheeded by the many, but veritable 
existences, and part of the universal bsauty. The white 
glow of sunlight begins and ends in color. There is 
more glory and gladness than men commonly observe in 

DAVKREAK. 

Through rosy dawns of June I go, 

Again the deepening sweetness part, 

While all their raptures round me flow 
And bubble freshly in my heart. 

The broad blue mountains lift their brows 

. Barely to bathe them in the blaze ; 
The bobolinks from silence rouse 
And flash along melodious ways ! 

And hid beneath the grasses, wet 

With long carouse, a honeyed crew, 

Anemone and violet, 

Yet rollicking, are drunk with dew. 

How soft the wind that blows my hair — 
That steals the song off from my lip, 

And mounts in gladder tumult where 

The numerous branches bend and dip ! 

How proudly smiling on his love 
The sun rides up the central blue, 



3o8 WAIFS AND THEIR A UTHORS. 

While like the wing of summer's dove 

She changes to his changing view. / 

All loveliness in every light, 

Voluptuous beauty o'er her strewn, 

A thing to lap the soul's delight 

While morning widens into noon. 

Harriet E. Prescott was born m Calais, Me., April 
3, 1835, and educated in Derry, N. H., and Newbury- 
port, Mass. After she had acquired a wide reputation, 
through the magazines and the books we have referred to, 
she was married to Mr. Richard S. Spofford at Newbury- 
port, where her only child was born, and where she 
still resides a large part of the time. It would seem as if 
her home must have been always by the sea, so familiar 
is she with its lights and shades, the weather-wisdom of its 
followers, their superstitions and their whims. Coast- 
life, its solitudes, its companionships, its contrasts and its 
tragic possibilities, are to her ever as a lesson learned. 
She is equally certain of herself in calm and stoim. She 
delights as much in the raging, roaring gale, as in tran- 
quil swells and gently rippling waves. 

"The South Breaker" would justify any extravagant 
words we might use in this connection. Very wisely did 
Rossiter Johnson include that sketch in his admirable 
''Little Classics" series, for in th^ field of contemporane- 
ous Romance it has become classic. In its way, it is so 
perfect as to challenge criticism. Beyond its descriptive 
excellence literary art can not hope to go. And yet it3 



HARRIET PRE SCOTT SPOFFORD. 



309 



description is not more graphic than much Mrs. Spofford 
has given us beside. In this respect her pen is almost dan- 
gerously facile. It overflows with verbiage, yet every word 
has the merit of fitness, and the reader would never have 
it more selfish of wealth. Indeed, Mrs. Spofford is one of 
the few writers whom it is a genuine pleasure to read for 
the words' sake simply, without regard to any meaning of 
the text. Her very sentences charm by their beauty, as 
well as fascinate often by their force. She is never sparing, 
yet never redundant. All that can be said, for the effect's 
sake, she says, but there she stays her hand. 

Yet one of the secrets of her marvelous art is the 
fact that she never seems to be saying anything for effect. 
No feature of any scene is introduced for an apparent 
descriptive purpose, to heighten the general view. It was 
all there, you feel, before she began. She is merely tell- 
ing of what is. Like a true artist, she leaves nothing 
out, but she is pre-Raphaelistic. She is intensely real ; 
so real that you see what she sees, feel what she feels. If 
her heart be passion-swept for an instant, so is yours. If 
she is gazing into the clear depths of heaven, your eyes be- 
hold the same stars. If fog and darkness chill her 
through and through, you shiver even as does she. 

This strongly realistic power is rare. It pre-supposes 
not only the most powerful imagination, but the keenest 
observation, and the most subtle sentiment — a sentiment 
that runs from heart to heart, from life to life, and of 
which we get a glimpse in the following 



3io WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS, 

SONG . 

It was nothing but a rose I gave her, 

Nothing but a rose 
Any wind might rob of half its savor, 

Any wind that blows. 

When she took it from my trembling fingers, 

With a hand as chill — 
Ah, the flying touch upon them lingers, 

Stays and thrills them still ! 

Withered, faded, pressed between these pages. 

Crumpled, fold on fold — 
Once it lay upon her breast, and ages 

Can not make it old ! 

These three stanzas were first published in Harper's 
Bazar, io which Mrs. Spofford has been a frequent con- 
tributor, as were the three entitled 

APRIL . 

A gush of bird-song, a patter of dew, 
A cloud, and a rainbow's warning. 

Suddenly sunshine and perfect blue — 
An April day in the morning ! 

Magical, autumn hazes are, 

And sweet is your summer weather 

With its purple midnight's throbbing star 
Over lovers clasped together. 

But dearer to me these daring flowers 
The passionate noontide scorning, 

This gladsome slipping of silver showers, 
This April day in the morning ! 



HARRIE T FRESCO TT SPOFFORD. 3 j i 

It is in the dear resurrection time of the year that a 
nameless longing fills every breast, mute, it may be, per- 
haps never striving for articulation, yet happily voiced in 
this apostrophe, likewise from the Bazar ; 

O, SOFT SPRING AIRS. 

Come up, come up, O, soft spring airs, 
Come from your silver shining seas, 

Where all day long you toss the waves 
About the low and palm-plumed keys ! 



Forsake the spicy lemon groves, j 

The balms and blisses of the South, 1 

And blow across the longing land ,' 

The breath of your delicious mouth. ^ 

I 

Come from the almond bough you stir, j 

The myrtle thicket where you sigh — ; 

Oh, leave the nightingale, for here ■ 

The robin whistles far and nigh ! ■ 

For here the violet in the wood • 

Thrills with the sweetness you shall take, .^ 

And wrapped away from life and love :> 

The wild rose dreams, and fain would wake. j 

For here is reed and rush and grass, -' 

And tiptoe in the dark and dew, \ 

Each sod of the brown earth aspires _\ 

To meet the sun, the sun and you ! '^ 

Then come, O fresh spring airs, once more , 

Create the old delightful things, ■ 

And woo the frozen world again ■ 

With hints of heaven upon your wings ! '< 



312 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

But before the spring's gladness and promise there is 
ever a winter of weariness and regret, unless one remem- 
bers, as did Mrs. Spofford in Leslies Illustrated Weekly, 
that there is something more than frost and death 

UNDER THE SNOWDRIFT. 

Under the snowdrift the blossoms are sleeping, 
Dreaming their dreams of sunshine and June, 
Down in the hush of their quiet they 're keeping 
Thrills from the throstle's wild summer-swung tune. 

Under the snowdrifts what blossoms are sleeping 
Never to waken with sunshine or June ! 
Do they dream dreams of the eyes that are weeping — 
Under the snowdrift — by midnight and noon ? 

Mrs. Spofford is a strange product of New England 
culture and life, it we are to measure these by ac- 
cepted popular standards. That Puritanism could beget 
such fervidness of fancy, such fragrance of feeling, such 
exuberance of imagination and such warmth of passion as 
she embodies, who would believe? From thought in 
Quaker garb she takes us as by magic to thought robed 
in purple and scarlet. With her there are no neutral tints. 
Her colors are pronounced, distinct, glowing. Is it be- 
cause she seems to stand forever so near to the tragic side 
of things .? She does seem to stand there — to see the un- 
written tragedies that none may ever read — to take at 
times a morbid pleasure in the pains and griefs that vex 
so many, and make sad the world. Yet when any of her 
characters are tragically overcome, one can not resist the 



HARRIE T FRESCO TT SPOFFORD. 3 1 3 

fancy, or haply the feeling, that she grieves over it even 
to the bitterness of tears. 

Mrs. Spofford's later books are ' ' New England Le- 
gends, " and "A Thief in the Night." Her work is 
chiefly for the magazines, and consists mainly of short 
stories, so full of popular interest, albeit so admirable as 
to art, that they are generally copied by the newspapers, 
and extensively read. She writes comparatively little 
verse, but what she does put forth meets commonly the 
same wide perusal. If it be never so strong, so intense, 
as her prose, there is small wonder. Such power never 
expresses itself to the fullest extent in two ways. 

We have alluded to Mrs. Spofford's intense sympa- 
thy with Nature. In the following it is plainly apparent, 
and as we read the wish will rise that we might be where 
it is always 

AFTERNOON . 

The boat is rocking on the river ; 
The river life is all awake ; 
The tide is coming in ; 
A thousand ripples run and shiver ; 

Oars flash ; and where the waters break 
Flashes a silver fin. 

Oars flash and dip ; as if on wings 

We sweep above the sweeping stream, 
While like a fount of light 
Into the sun the sturgeon springs, 

And blue the arrowy swallows gleam 
Above us in their flight. 



314 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

Beyond the breakers and the bar 

The great ships with their swelling sails 
Are tossing out to sea ; 
They slide through night and distance far 
For gulfs where brood the unknown gales 
To tempt the mystery. 

But we, between the blossoming shores, 

Wilt pluck the boughs, will mark the rills, 
Tumbling their foam along, 
Will wait, in restmg on our oars, 

Some message from the mighty hills, 
Or catch some plowboy's song. 

Or, happier we than they whose choice 
Pursues the dark and awful swells, 
Thus, till the stars, to roam, 
And turn when, like a mother's voice, 
We hear the tender evening bells 
Chiding us sweetly home ! 

Something of Mrs. Spofford's philosophy — aye 
something of her faith, that sweeter, better thing — shines 
out in a poem on "Sorrow, " which personifies the god- 
dess of grief, and questions if, finally, there be any hope 
in death. 

Then Sorrow, pale and statuesque, 

Lifts heavenward her blind blue eyes, 
While, gorgeous as an arabesque. 

The bloom of summer round her li-es. 
Though she nor blossom sees nor star. 

The murmur of the wind she hears, 
And answering, smiles more awful far 

Because forlorn of any tears ; 



HARRIET PRE SCOTT SPOFFORD. 3 15 ; 

" In God's great music I "? 

Am the unfailing minor, • i 

And every sigh, spreading from heart to eye, '': 

Throbs on the chord diviner. -\ 

•• My fate is Him I trust, 

To v^hom alone I hearken ; i 

My Lord and King, my Merciful and Just, f 

More bright as shadows darken ! i 

" I grasp hearts till they bleed, \ 

I strengthen bitterly, ;' 

I sow a seed which saints indeed, : 

Reap for me utterly. ^ 

" On cheerless roads no smile j 

Breaking to echoing laughter ; ,• 

His patience I accept a little while, \ 

And find His joy hereafter. i 

" O dreary, dreaiy stay I ' ■; 

Yet on great faith relying, ,': 

Blind to the gay, fleet pageant of to-day, i 

What splendor com.es through dying ! " \ 

Then comes another question, re-echoing in so many ] 

hearts even now : '' 

" What is that last dread breath — to die ?" '\ 

and we cannot better close this chapter and our book ^ 

than by giving Sorrow's sweet and beautiful answer : •; 

" To feel God's glory breaking through j 

Heaven after heaven, and streaming down "' 

To gather off the cold death-dew ;? 

And wipe my forehead in its crown ; ,; 



3i6 WAIFS AND THEIR AUTHORS. 

*' To hear a voice unheard before. 

Or in a dream but dimly guessed, 
Whose fall more sweet than sea to shore,- 
Whose burden — ' Child, come to thy rest ! * 



' To wake on light at dead of night, 

To float on seas most clear and broad, 
To read the scroll of life aright, 
To die— and find Thee, Lord ! " 





L' Eruirot, 



TILL oft the Longing soul goes out 

Oil wing of song its good to find, 
A?td -flying far der flood and doubt 



Its ark of bondage leaves behi?id. 

Full oft the olive branch of rest 

It brings to those who waiting stand, 

When strength has fled its beating breast 
In weary search for promised land. 

And fain would I sing back to those 
Who sing to me, with note as clear 

As flutters front, the lark thai goes 
In quest of heaven s open ear. 

But leaving now these singing ones, 
I waft them only this refrain : — 

Sing on ! till imder stniling suns 

No song of peace is born of pain / 

Sing on ! till some glad day of days 
Eternal glories on you shine, 

And every plaint be turned to praise 
In song Immortal as Divine I 



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